Believe in Yourself: Reflexive Pronouns Made Easy

To understand reflexive pronouns, think for a moment about your language learning journey. If you are here, you are probably an independent learner. You try to understand English the best way you can, and when in doubt, you make the effort to search for reliable sources.

Yes, sure, you might have a dedicated teacher to help you or you might use a rigorous but entertaining language learning app, but you are doing a lot of work on your own. One might say that you teach yourself many skills to be able to speak English and to improve every single day.

So what’s the point of all this? That underlined word in the previous paragraph, ‘yourself,’ is a reflexive pronoun. One way we use reflexive pronouns is to talk about actions that we complete independently, but they have many other uses as well.

This article will explain what reflexive pronouns are, what situations we use them in, how they help us in communication and how to avoid the most common mistakes. (Make sure to read until the very end so you won’t miss the paragraph on reflexive pronouns’ superpowers!)

By the end of this article you will be able to practice using reflexive pronouns in everyday communication.

What is a reflexive pronoun?

In general, reflexive pronouns refer back to a person that we have mentioned earlier in the same sentence. Look at these examples:

• He taught himself how to swim.
• I cut myself peeling an orange.
• They congratulated themselves on a job well done.
• Go look at yourself in the mirror.

In the first sentence, the reflexive pronoun ‘himself’ refers to the same person as the word ‘he’ at the beginning of the sentence. In the second and third sentences, ‘themselves’ refers to ‘they,’ and ‘myself’ refers to ‘I.’ In the last sentence, ‘yourself’ refers to ‘you’ (the person being spoken to).

So in other words, the reflexive pronoun always matches the subject of the sentence. The table below shows the reflexive pronouns that correspond to each subject pronoun. For a review of subject pronouns, take a look at our guide to using pronouns in everyday conversation.

As you can see, every subject has a corresponding pronoun. The singular pronouns I, you, he, she and it end with -self, while the plural pronouns we, you and they end with -selves.

Note that a common mistake is to mix some of these with other pronouns and say hisself and theirselves, but these are not grammatically correct.

When do we use reflexive pronouns?

Although reflexive pronouns can be used with a wide variety of verbs, there are certain verbs that are more commonly used. Here’s a list of verbs that are often used with reflexive pronouns, each with an example sentence:

• Behave – The children behaved themselves during the visit.
• Blame – Don’t blame yourself for this accident.
• Cut – He cut himself while chopping vegetables.
• Dress – He dressed himself quickly in the morning.
• Enjoy – They enjoyed themselves at the party.
• Help – She helped herself to some cookies.
• Hurt – He hurt himself playing football.
• Introduce – She introduced herself to the new neighbors.
• Look at – He looked at himself in the mirror.
• Prepare – She prepared herself for the exam.
• Teach – I taught myself to play the piano.

As you can see, many of these verbs describe intentional, self-directed actions like dress, help, prepare and teach. Others describe unintentional actions, like hurt or cut. And some describe psychological or emotional actions like blame or enjoy.

To use or not to use a reflexive pronoun: A matter of emphasis

In many cases a reflexive pronoun is not required, but you can add one to add emphasis to your sentence. For example, look at the following two sentences:

• I studied a lot to prepare for this exam.
• I studied a lot to prepare myself for this exam.

Both of these sentences are perfectly acceptable. While the meaning of these sentences is very similar, the second one used the word myself to emphasize that preparing for the exam is something I did for my own benefit. It also suggests more intense preparation for the exam.

Reflexive and intensive pronouns

Reflexive pronouns can also give extra meaning to a sentence. This is very common and can make a big difference. Look at these sentences and the extra meaning that they contain:

• I prepared this cake myself. (Meaning: No one helped me.)
• The owner himself served our meal. (Meaning: He didn’t ask someone else to do it.)
• You yourself are responsible for your work. (Meaning: You can’t expect me to do it.)
• I’ll do it myself. (Meaning: I’m not going to expect anyone else to do it.)

Notice how the reflexive pronoun can either go right after the subject (the owner himself, you yourself) or at the end of the sentence (I prepared this cake myself, I’ll do it myself). In each case the reflexive pronoun emphasizes the subject of the sentence. This kind of reflexive pronoun is called an intensive pronoun. They are not necessary to the sentence but are added to give special emphasis.

Fun fact: The very first sentence of one of English literature's most well-known novels, Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, contains this type of expression: “Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.”

Common mistakes

As we discussed before, it’s important to remember that reflexive pronouns always refer to someone that was previously mentioned. If you keep this simple rule in mind you will avoid many common mistakes regarding these words. Look at the sentences below:

• Incorrect: If you need a ride, you can come with Bob and myself.

• Correct: If you need a ride, you can come with Bob and me.
  

• Incorrect: Stella and myself are going to the store.

• Correct: Stella and I are going to the store.

As you can see, in both cases we can’t use a reflexive pronoun because they refer to someone who was not previously mentioned in the sentence.

Another common mistake concerns mixing reflexive pronouns and the pronoun each other. Have a look:

• They talk to each other every day.
  (Meaning: Two people talk to one another every day.)
  

• They talk to themselvesevery day.
  (Meaning: Each person talks to himself or herself every day.)
  

So, while we can often use both pronouns in the same sentence, it will always result in a significant difference of meaning. Let’s look at a few more examples.

• They look at each other and smile. (Meaning: One person looks at the other person.)
• They look at themselves and smile. (Meaning: Each person looks at him or herself.)
• They write letters to each other. (Meaning: One person writes to the other and vice versa.)
• They write letters to themselves. (Meaning: Each person writes to him or herself.)

As you have seen so far, reflexive pronouns have some very important uses. Before we close, there is another interesting piece of information that we saved for last.

Reflexive pronouns’ superpower: Changing the meaning of verbs

Reflexive pronouns have this really interesting quality. When you put a reflexive pronoun after certain verbs, the verb takes on a special meaning. The following table has some examples so you can see how this works:

Wrapping up

As we have seen in this article, reflexive pronouns refer to someone previously mentioned in the same sentence. In some cases using the pronoun is mandatory, especially with verbs that express an accident or an injury. In some cases, however, you can choose to add a reflexive pronoun to create more context and extra meaning to what you’re saying.

Now that you know everything there is to know about reflexive pronouns, it’s time to apply yourself to practicing them and improving your English. Remember to believe in yourself, and keep on learning!