myself
pron/maɪˈsɛlf/ · /məˈsɛlf/
Etymology From Middle English myself, meself, from Old English mē selfum and similar phrases, equivalent to me + self, later partly reinterpreted as my + self / -self. Cognate with Scots mysel, mysell (“myself”), West Frisian mysels (“myself”), Dutch mijzelf (“myself”), German mich selbst, mir selbst (“myself”), Norwegian Bokmål meg selv (“myself”).
Pronoun Me, as direct or indirect object the speaker as the object of a verb or preposition, when the speaker is also the subject.
- I taught myself.
- (I) don’t think much of your new car, myself.
2 more examples
- Thinks I to myself, “Sol, you're run off your course again. This is a rich man's summer ‘cottage’ and if you don't look out there's likely to be some nice, lively dog taking an interest in your underpinning.”1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
- “If you were a little bit kinder to yourself today, or if you gained insight, if you had an ‘Aha’ like, ‘Oh, man, I really do talk to myself the way my mom talked to me,’ or you identify a childhood wound … all of that is a form of reparenting,” she said.2025 April 28, Madeline Holcombe, “It might be time to ‘reparent’ yourself. Here’s how to get started”, in CNN:
Personally, for my part; used in apposition to I, sometimes for simple emphasis and sometimes with implicit exclusion of any others performing the activity described.
- I myself have witnessed the event.
In my normal state of body or mind.
- I feel like myself.
Proscribed Me, as the object of a verb or preposition without a reflexive trigger. Sometimes used for intensifying the pronoun of oneself.
- Give the ball to John or myself.
Archaic, Proscribed I (as the subject of a verb).
- My wife and myself want to go on vacation.
- And my selfe have knowen a Gentleman, a chiefe officer of our crowne, that by right and hope of succession (had he lived unto it) was to inherit above fifty thousand crownes a yeere good land[…].1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 8, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:
1 more example
- Myself am confident that an ointment of it is one of the best remedies for a scabby head that is.1653, Nicholas Culpeper, The English Physician Enlarged:
India, Pakistan, Nonstandard my name is...
- Myself John.
- Synonyms
- me
- Related terms
57 terms
myselves, I'll see myself out, Ime, me, myselfmemysen, mine, mymineme, we, us, ourselvesourselfoursen, oursourn, our, you, yourselfyoursen, yoursyourn, your, thou, thee, thyselftheeselfthysen, thine, thythine, youye, yourselves, you ally'all you guys yous, y'allselves, all yours y'all's you guys' your guys', all your y'all's your all's you guys' your guys', he, him, himselfhisselfhissen, hishisn, his, she, her, herselfhersen, hershern, ithit, itselfhitself, itshis, itshishits, they, them, themself, themselves, theirs, their, one, oneself, –, one's, themhem, 'em, themselvestheirsen, theirstheirn, The following table shows a list of English personal pronoun, including archaic and dialectal forms. Dialectal and obsolete, archaic forms are in italics. 1 See Appendix:English third-person singular pronouns for attested neopronoun.