Why 'I Love You' Is Never Yo Amo Tú

Added: 2026-05-09

[00:00:00]How to use pronouns in Spanish [music] and why it's so different from English?

[00:00:04]I mean, it's not that different, but now you have to program your brain [music] and start thinking in Spanish. When it comes to pronouns, it's really important that you remember how to place it in Español. But first, what is a pronoun?

[00:00:19]When you're talking about Carlos, you don't say Carlos all the time. You use a little word to replace that name, that noun. In Spanish, we would say él, right? In English, it is he. [snorts] That is a pronoun, but in this case we're using a personal one. Yo, tú, él, ellos, those are personal pronouns. But we're going to study today the ones that are receiving the action. Like when I say, I love you. How do you say that you? It's not tú. In this case, we're going to use te. But how to place it in Español? But first, remember that if you're enjoying this video, please like and subscribe. And if you want to learn Spanish when you're here in Medellín, visit us in nammedspanishmedellin.com.

[00:01:04]We have classes for you from 5:00 to 7:00, only for adults. Here we're going to cover all the hacks and all the patterns that we have created and developed for you. All right, in order to understand pronouns, we need to get the sentence structure in Español.

[00:01:24]How does a sentence work in Spanish? We have always a subject, someone who is performing the action, like yo, for example. Then we always need a verb in Spanish, a conjugated verb. Subject plus verb. With that, I can create a sentence in Spanish. Actually, in Español, to have a sentence, you can only use one word, like estudio.

[00:01:48]What do you do, man?

[00:01:50]Estudio. That's a sentence because the subject is included in the verb. It's here. It means yo estudio, I study, but this is always optional. You don't need to use it all the time. If you don't want to sound gringo or narcissistic by saying all the time yo, yo, yo, it's not necessary. It's optional. You can say only estudio, I study. If you say yo estudio, it means I do study. It's like an emphasis that you don't want to be making all the time. All right. Then we can use complementary information, information about when or where you're doing the action, like yo estudio Español en Nomad, right? That would be complementary information. En la noche, de 5 a 7, from 5:00 to 7:00, is when am I performing this action. Sometimes the complementary information can give you an answer about what.

[00:02:44]What is receiving the action? If I say, estudio Español, Español is the complementary information replying to the question what.

[00:02:54]And in this case, we're going to call it an object.

[00:02:58]Objeto.

[00:03:01]When we have an objeto in a sentence, we can replace it with pronouns. For example, I study Spanish. I can replace it with I study it, right? That is an object pronoun. I study it. When I say I love you, you're receiving the action love, so you are the object in the sentence. You are the complementary information that is replying to the question what, which is an object. I love you, I need to replace that you not again with tú, but with te. But let's see them. So, if I say bebo café, it means I drink coffee. What is the object in this sentence? You can pause the video to think about it. All right, it is café, right? If I say leo un libro, what is the object?

[00:03:53]Of course, un libro. If I say amo a mi madre, what is the object in the sentence? Mi madre, right? So, I can replace café, libro and madre with pronouns when I have in the context information about what am I talking about. If I ask you, do you love your mother? You're not going to say, yes, I love my mom. You replace it. You say, yes, I love her.

[00:04:20]So, that's the pronoun here. We're going to check what are the pronouns in Spanish to replace coffee, book, mom, you, me, if I'm receiving the action.

[00:04:29]All right, so the objeto directo pronouns are for me, yo, I'm going to replace it with the word me. So, if I'm receiving the action, you call me, you love me, I'm going to use in Spanish a word that is similar in English, but you need to remember the pronunciation is different.

[00:04:48]It's not me, it's me, right? For you, like I said before, it's te. If I'm replacing him, her or an object like it, it would be lo or la. And this is what we're going to be covering today. This is the important part. This is going to be él o ella.

[00:05:11]But let's see it in English again, because you have the same pronouns in Inglés. Me, you, him, her, and it.

[00:05:23]And this is when you need to think about the English brain and the Spanish brain.

[00:05:26]This is when it gets tricky. You cannot translate word by word when you're using pronouns in Spanish. That's why you need to start thinking in Español, creating the phrases from the Spanish, because if you translate word by word, it doesn't make sense in Spanish. Let show you an example. If I say, I love you, probably you already know this sentence.

[00:05:47]We don't say yo amo te, which is the pronoun receiving the action. We need to say, you I love in Español. So, what we say in a Spanish would be te amo. And if you want to say, I do love you, you can place the yo here in front. Remember, it's optional. Te amo.

[00:06:10]Again, you I love. This is what we're saying in Spanish. This is what makes sense in Español. So, make sure you translate it like this. You say it like this. Remember always the structure of te amo to say something like, I bought it. How would you say that? I bought it.

[00:06:30]You're talking about the book. Did you buy the book? Yes, I bought it. How would you say that? To buy is comprar and we're using here the past tense, which is compré. I bought means compré.

[00:06:44]So, how do you put this, I bought it?

[00:06:48]Remember the structure of te amo, you I love. We are going to say here, it I bought. How do you say that? Pause the video and think about it. You have all the information here. If I'm talking about el libro, it's masculine, so I'm going to use the pronoun lo. So, how do you say again, I bought it?

[00:07:07]Lo compré.

[00:07:10]Again, the structure in English would be it I bought.

[00:07:17]But that doesn't make sense in English, right? So, speaking Spanish means that you're not going to translate all the time like literally. You need to think about this structure. That's what I meant when I said the English brain and the Spanish brain. Sometimes the structures are similar in thinking in English words, but sometimes you need to start doing this directly in Spanish. Okay, next question. How do you say, you love me?

[00:07:41]I know you do, right?

[00:07:42]How would you say that? Let's put it here. You love me.

[00:07:48]All right, I know I'm receiving the action, so I'm going to be applying this pronoun. How do you say you love? Amas.

[00:07:56]And where do I place this me?

[00:07:59]Here or here? Pause the video.

[00:08:02]Yeah, it goes in front. Me amas.

[00:08:05]It goes before the verb. All right, so when you have your conjugation already, present tense, past tense, I'm only applying here yo and tú, which is pretty much what you need when surviving, being able to ask, being able to say what you do and asking other people what they are doing. So, yo and tú is enough. And that's what I'm going to use to understand better the pronouns. If I say to call, I'm going to practice this way.

[00:08:30]To call is llamar in Español. How do you say, I call?

[00:08:36]That's right. Llamo.

[00:08:39]Because it's the present tense. And how do you say, I called in the past?

[00:08:43]It would be, I follow my conjugation, llamé. And now it's about using me, te or lo or la. Me, you, him, her or it.

[00:08:56]How do you say, I call you every day? Where do I place the pronoun? All right, it goes here. Te llamo todos los días. I called you yesterday. Since I already know this, I know that I place the pronoun before.

[00:09:12]Again, te. Te llamé. Te llamé ayer. I called you yesterday. Then it's only about replacing the verb and the conjugation. Let's say you're going to use the verb to need. How do you say to need? Necesitar. How would you say then, this is a quiz time, I need you? Pause the video. Yeah, it would be te necesito.

[00:09:37]And what about I needed you in the past, not anymore?

[00:09:41]Yeah, that's it. Te necesité.

[00:09:45]I'm conjugating and I'm putting who's receiving the action. I'm going to be repeating this a lot of time because this is a challenging topic in Spanish.

[00:09:52]I've seen it. I've been teaching Spanish for 11 years and let me tell you, my students always struggle here, but once they get this, they are able to speak about almost everything. When I was learning English, it took me a while to understand that you needed to put the pronoun at the end like I love you, I love her. And then I needed to restructure my brain. Okay, now I need to stop thinking in Spanish because if I translate word by word, it doesn't make sense. And then it took me a while to get used to it. And then I started listening to music and music you're going to see it a lot. I love you, I need you, I miss you. And then it starts to make sense. So you can listen to music in Spanish to use in this verbs this way and this pronouns like this.

[00:10:36]All right, now what if we change the one who's receiving? How do you say you call me every night? Pause the video. In this case, okay, we're going to replace the conjugation. It's not llamo anymore, it's llamas. You call.

[00:10:51]And since I'm receiving, I'm going to change the te and now it's going to be me llamas. Me llamas, you call me. Me llamas todas las noches. What about you need me?

[00:11:04]Yeah, it would be me necesitas. I replace the conjugation. You called me yesterday. How do you say that? Pause the video.

[00:11:14]Yeah, it would be me and I follow my conjugation. Me llamaste.

[00:11:22]And what if you want to say you call him every week? What do you replace here?

[00:11:27]You call still llamas, but now I'm not the one receiving, it's him. What is the pronoun for him? We have it here. Lo llamas todos los días, todas las semanas. You called him in the past.

[00:11:42]Yeah, it would be lo llamaste.

[00:11:46]And if I'm going to replace it with her, I call her, I need her, it would be la.

[00:11:52]La llamas, la llamo. Who's performing is here in the verb and who's receiving goes before. So if you want me to go over more about this, there's a lot to say about pronouns. Let me know in the comments and remember to visit us in namaspanishmedellin.com where we're going to teach you real Spanish, real Medellin, Namaspanishmedellin.

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