The other day, one of my students told me she was confused about when to say myself vs. by myself. Since I’ve heard others struggle with these expressions too, I decided to make this post.
Today, we’ll delve into the difference between the expressions myself, yourself, etc. and by myself, by yourself, etc.
First, let’s explore the meaning and uses in sentences.
The family of reflexive or emphasizing pronouns
The word myself is a part of a family of reflexive or emphasizing pronouns:
myself
yourself
himself
herself
itself
ourselves
yourselves
themselves
oneself
These pronouns are used when the subject and object of a sentence refer to the same person or thing. As reflexive pronouns, they indicate that the action is directed back to the same entity performing it. As emphasizing pronouns, they are used to add emphasis on who is performing the action.
So, I will be using myself when the action is performed by me and it is either directed back to me or if I want to emphasize the fact that I am doing the action. Similarly, I will be using yourself when the action is performed by you and it is directed back to you or when I want to stress on the fact that it is done by you. You get the point.
The word oneself is primarily used in writing and more formal language as a reflexive pronoun and it refers to a generic person rather than specific individuals.
For example:
One should always strive to be true to oneself.
Let’s now look at different uses of myself.
myself directed back to me
Here are some examples of the use of myself. as a reflective pronoun where my action is directed back to me:
I’m going to buy myself a cup of coffee.
I ask myself whom I want to become.
I talked myself out of it.
In these examples you are the doer and the receiver. This means that you are doing the action, but you are also applying the action to you. You are buying the coffee for you, you are asking you, you are convincing you not to do something.
Let’s also look at a slightly different pattern with verbs that require preposition before the object.
For example:
She often speaks to herself.
I need to rely on myself.
We laughed at ourselves.
myself adding emphasis on me
But you can also use myself to add emphasis. That is, to emphasize the fact that you are the one doing the action, and not someone else. The function of myself in this context is known as the emphasizing pronoun. For example:
I fixed the car myself.
Notice that in speech, we are putting the stress on self.
I wrote the report myself.
I myself am responsible for the project’s success.
These sentences would be perfectly ok without using myself. You could say:
I fixed the car.
I wrote the report.
I am responsible for the project’s success.
But by adding myself, you are emphasizing that it was you who did it.
by myself = on my own / alone
Now, the expression by myself means on my own or alone, and without the help or the company of anyone else. If you do something by yourself, it means that no one else has helped you.
For example:
I studied by myself.
I went to Italy by myself.
Before I got married, I lived by myself.
In these sentences, you can swap by myself with alone or on my own:
I studied alone.
or:
I studied on my own.
I went to Italy alone.
or:
I went to Italy on my own.
Before I got married, I lived alone.
or:
Before I got married, I lived on my own.
myself vs. by myself – cases with different meanings
Now, let’s address some potential confusions when swapping terms myself and by myself. There are many cases where such change wouldn’t affect the meaning in a significant way, and we’ll explore those later in this video. But first, let’s examine situations where the meaning does indeed change.
Let’s say you are married or you live with someone and your significant other went on a business trip. One of your friends calls and asks you:
Hey, what are you guys doing?
You can say:
Well, my husband is on a business trip. I’m by myself.
This means that you are home alone.
But now imagine the exact same situation, but you answer:
Well, my husband is on a business trip. I’m myself.
This changes the whole meaning. Being yourself means that you like who you are, that you live your life the way you want to without asking permission from anyone else. So, if you say My husband is on a business trip. I’m myself, this means that you feel you can show your real personality only when your spouse is away. That’s a terrible way to feel and say.
Let’s go over some other examples:
I painted by myself.
vs.
I painted myself.
These two sentences have very different meanings. I painted by myself means that you produced a painting – or painted a room, for example – alone, without anyone else’s help.
On the other hand, I painted myself can be interpreted in a couple of ways depending on the context. It may either mean that you created a painting representing you, or that you painted something on your own body.
If you want to emphasize that it’s you who took the action of painting, you have to include the object of painting explicitly:
I painted it myself.
or:
I myself painted it.
Here, it is the object of painting, and myself emphasizes the fact that you were the one who painted it.
Here is another example:
I study by myself.
vs.
I study myself.
I study by myself means that you study alone, without anyone else.
I study myself means that you are examining your own body. Maybe you are looking in the mirror.
Here’s a sentence I found online when I searched for this term:
I studied myself in the mirror, telling myself that I was beautiful inside and out, trying hard to believe the outward part.
myself vs. by myself – cases with similar meanings
Now, as I mentioned earlier, there are many cases where swapping myself and by myself produces a difference that is much more subtle. Here if you use one instead of the other it’s not gonna completely change the meaning like it did in the previous examples.
For example, let’s look at the difference between:
I did it myself.
and:
I did it by myself.
When you say I did it myself, you emphasize that it was you and not anyone else who did it.
When you say I did it by myself, you are stressing on the fact that you were alone when you did it.
Basically, you can think of these two phrases as:
I did it – where the emphasis is on I.
and:
I did it alone – where the emphasis is on alone.
This would be a good way to check if you are using the one you want to use.
Here are more examples:
She completed the project herself.
vs.
She completed the project by herself.
I cooked dinner myself.
vs.
I cooked dinner by myself.
★
Let me know in the comments if there are any other similar words or phrases that still confuse you.
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