How do you say “Don't BECOME jealous” or “GET happy” in Spanish?
This is a nice question 🙂
In Spanish, we use the verb PONERSE in many different ways… In this first case, the meaning of PONERSE is “TO BECOME”:
No te pongas celoso (Negative Imperative here).
Don’t become jealous.
As you can see, the verb here is in it’s reflexive form, so in the PRESENT:
yo ME pongo
tú TE pones
el/ella/usted SE pone
nosotros/as NOS ponemos
vosotros/as OS ponéis
ellos/ellas/ustedes SE ponen
Meaning:
I become, you become…, etc…
For a more comprehensive answer, we can dive into the whole topic of TRANSFORMATION VERBS. Let’s see how all these work in all possible contexts:
1. PONERSE (temporary effect) / VOLVERSE (longer effect) + “ADJECTIVES”
- Cuando te veo, me pongo contento
- When I see you, I become happy
- El cielo se está volviendo gris
- The sky is becoming grey
____
2. HACERSE (ideology and profession)
- Matías se ha hecho budista
- Matías has become buddhist
- Laura se está haciendo siempre más pacifista
- Laura is becoming always more pacifist
____
3. LLEGAR A / LLEGAR A SER (fruit of hard work and perseverance)
- Tú llegarás a ser fluente en español
- You will become fluent in Spanish :)
____
4. CONVERTIRSE / TRANSFORMARSE + EN + “NOUNS” (Radical changes)
- La iglesia se ha convertido en una discoteca
- The church has become a disco
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And that’s it! Now you just have to try to use them in your conversations, so you can assimilate them and feel more and more confident speaking Spanish!
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Qué tengas un día maravilloso!
Claudio
Claudio
Professional Spanish Coach with 15+ years of experience.
