If I were you, I'd read this post on subjunctive verbs

Have you ever noticed that sometimes people say things like 'If I were able to, I would dance all night', or 'If I were president, I'd make it illegal to chew loudly', and you're all like 'hang on friend, why are you talking in the past tense? Don't you mean "If I was able to, I would dance all night", and "If I was President, I'd make it illegal to chew loudly"?'

And then they say 'no way! I mean "if I were able to", because I'm talking in the subjunctive.'

The subjunctive is a verb form that you use when you are talking about scenarios that are not definitely going to happen. 

For example, instead of saying 'If I was God', you would generally say 'If I were God', because you're probably not going to become God anytime soon.

The structure of the subjunctive is easy. For all verbs except the past tense of be, the subjunctive is the same as the bare infinitive (infinitive without "to"):

be (past)               be (present)                        Other verbs, (i.e to swim)


I were                    I be                                     I swim

you were               you be                                  you swim

he, she, it were     he, she, it be                        he, she, it swim

we were                we be                                 we swim

 you were                you be                               you swim

they were              they be                                 they swim


As you can see, the subjunctive does not change according to person (I, you, he etc).

Here are some examples with a subjunctive verb:


The farmer insists that the barn be locked at night.

The doctor recommended that he join a gym.

It is essential that we leave as soon as possible

It was necessary that every student submit an essay by Friday

And now, a subjunctive treat for all my grammar brothers and sisters, an amazing home made video by two very clever cats, all about the Spanish subjunctive. It's a bit off topic for us, since I usually talk about Spanish grammar on my other blog 'Señor Gramática - Basta!, Es el momento de la gramática!' but who can resist when these two bright students sing 'And I'm like, Present, Present Subjunctive'