When do I use the subjunctive?

The first important thing to note about the subjunctive is that it is a mood, not a tense.It is mainly used to show the speaker's attitudes or feelings in the sentence There are several situations when the subjunctive mood needs to be used: expression of wishing/desireexpression of doubtexpression of command It is most commonly seen after the trigger phrases 'si' and 'que'. The formation of the subjunctive may seem confusing at first but it will become natural after a while. For '-ar' verbs, the '-o' is removed from the first person indicative and the '-er' and '-ir' endings are added. For example, for the regular '-ar' verb 'acabar' (to finish), it would look like this...: yo - acabe nosotros - acabemos tú - acabes vosotros - acabéis él/ella - acabe ellos/ellas - acaben Formation follows a similar pattern for 'er' and 'ir' verbs. Except the 'o' is removed from the 'yo' form in the indicative, and the present tense '-ar' verb endings are added. For example, for the regular verb 'vivir' (to live), it would look like this... yo - viva nosotros - vivamos tú- vivas vosotros - viváis él/ella - viva ellos/ellas - vivan There are several irregular verbs to learn that are used frequently, such as 'ser', 'tener' and 'saber', however it is essential to grasp the basics of how to form regular verbs in the subjunctive first before moving on to these.