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Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa.

Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa.
He/She thinks about himself/herself too much.

Breakdown of Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa.

hän
he/she
ajatella
to think
liikaa
too much
itseään
oneself
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Questions & Answers about Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa.

Why is there no word for “about” in Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa even though the English meaning is “He/She thinks about themself too much”?

In Finnish, the verb ajatella itself usually covers the idea of “think about”.

So:

  • Ajattelen sinua. = I think about you.
  • Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa. = He/She thinks about themself too much.

There is no separate preposition like about. Instead, ajatella takes its “object” in the partitive case (here: itseään), and that combination expresses thinking about someone or something.

You could also see structures like:

  • Ajattelen sinusta hyvää. – I think well of you.

Here sinusta (from you, elative case) is used, but in your sentence the basic and most common pattern is ajatella + partitive object with no extra word.

What exactly does itseään mean, and how is it different from häntä?

Both itseään and häntä can refer to the same person as hän, but they are used differently.

  • hän = he / she (subject form)
  • häntä = him / her (object, partitive case)
  • itse = self
  • itseään = themself / himself / herself (reflexive form, partitive)

itseään is a reflexive form. It refers back to the subject of the sentence:

  • Hän ajattelee itseään.
    He/She thinks about themself.

If you said:

  • Hän ajattelee häntä.

it would naturally be understood as:

  • He/She thinks about him/her (another person),
    not about themself.

So itseään explicitly marks that the person is thinking about themself, not about someone else.

Why is itseään in the partitive case and not something like itsensä?

The form itseään is the partitive singular of the reflexive pronoun itse with a 3rd‑person possessive ending.

Many verbs of mental state or emotion in Finnish, including ajatella (to think), commonly take their object in the partitive:

  • Ajattelen sinua. – I think about you.
  • Rakastan sinua. – I love you.
  • Pelkään pimeää. – I am afraid of the dark.

By that same pattern:

  • infinitive: ajatella
  • verb + object (partitive): ajattelee itseään

Itsensä is the accusative/nominative-like form (“himself/herself” as a fully affected object), used with verbs that normally take that kind of object:

  • Hän näkee itsensä peilistä.
    He/She sees themself in the mirror.

With ajatella, the natural, idiomatic choice is partitive, hence itseään, not itsensä.

How is itseään built up morphologically?

itseään can be broken down like this:

  • itse – self
  • itseä – partitive singular of itse
  • itseä
    • 3rd‑person possessive suffix -nsa/-nsä → itseänsä
      (an older / more formal form)
  • in modern standard language, itseänsä contracts to itseään

So conceptually:

itse (self) + ä (partitive) + (n)sä (3rd person possessor)
= itseään (one’s own self in partitive)

The possessive ending tells you that the “owner” of self is the 3rd person subject (hän). That’s what makes it reflexive: themself.

Why does hän mean both “he” and “she”? How do you know which one it is?

Finnish personal pronouns are gender‑neutral:

  • hän = he / she (human, singular)
  • se = it (and often also “he/she” in colloquial speech)
  • There is no separate grammatical distinction between male and female.

In Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa, hän could be:

  • He thinks about himself too much.
  • She thinks about herself too much.

You find out the gender only from context (or you simply leave it unspecified, which is perfectly normal in Finnish).

What form is ajattelee, and what is the basic dictionary form of this verb?

ajattelee is:

  • 3rd person singular
  • present tense
  • indicative mood
  • active voice

The dictionary form (infinitive) is ajatella, to think.

Conjugation (present indicative) for reference:

  • minä ajattelen – I think
  • sinä ajattelet – you think
  • hän ajattelee – he/she thinks
  • me ajattelemme – we think
  • te ajattelette – you (pl.) think
  • he ajattelevat – they think

Finnish normally uses this same present tense also for future meaning when context requires it:

  • Hän ajattelee sitä huomenna. – He/She will think about it tomorrow.
What exactly does liikaa mean, and how does it differ from liian paljon?

liikaa is an adverb meaning “too much” (in excess).

  • Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa.
    He/She thinks about themself too much.

It comes from liika (excess, something extra), but in this adverbial form liikaa you most often see it as a fixed word meaning too much.

You can often replace it with liian paljon, which also means too much / too many:

  • Hän ajattelee itseään liian paljon.

The nuance:

  • liikaa sounds a bit more compact, sometimes slightly stronger or more informal.
  • liian paljon is more literal: “too many/much (of them)”.

In this sentence, both are grammatically correct; liikaa is the more typical choice.

Can the word order be changed, for example Hän ajattelee liikaa itseään? Does that change the meaning?

Yes, you can change the word order in Finnish, and it usually affects emphasis rather than basic meaning.

  1. Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa.
    Neutral, straightforward:
    He/She thinks about themself too much.
    A slight focus on itseään (what is being thought about).

  2. Hän ajattelee liikaa itseään.
    Also possible. Now the adverb liikaa is closer to the verb, so the emphasis leans more to how much he/she thinks, but the overall meaning is still “thinks about themself too much.”

  3. Liikaa hän ajattelee itseään.
    Fronting liikaa strongly emphasises “too much”:
    It’s too much that he/she thinks about themself.

All of these can be understood the same way in most contexts. The original Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa is the most neutral, textbook version.

Could you drop hän and just say Ajattelee itseään liikaa?

Yes, you can omit the subject pronoun in Finnish when the person is clear from context, because the verb ending already shows the person and number.

  • Ajattelen itseäni liikaa. – I think about myself too much.
  • Ajattelet itseäsi liikaa. – You think about yourself too much.
  • Ajattelee itseään liikaa. – He/She thinks about themself too much.

In isolation, Ajattelee itseään liikaa could mean:

  • He thinks about himself too much.
  • She thinks about herself too much.
  • (or even it thinks about itself too much, in a very odd context)

In real conversation or text, the context usually makes it obvious who is being talked about, so leaving out hän is common and natural.

How would you say “He/She thinks too much” without specifying “about themself”?

To say just “He/She thinks too much” (general overthinking), you can drop the object:

  • Hän ajattelee liikaa.

This means:

  • He/She thinks too much / overthinks.

Adding itseään makes it specifically about focusing on oneself:

  • Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa.
    He/She thinks about themself too much (is too self‑centered / self‑absorbed).
How would you make this sentence negative, e.g. “He/She doesn’t think about themself too much”?

Finnish uses a special negative verb ei that is conjugated, and the main verb goes into a short connegative form.

Base sentence:

  • Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa.
    He/She thinks about themself too much.

Negative:

  • Hän ei ajattele itseään liikaa.
    He/She does not think about themself too much.

Changes:

  • ei is the 3rd person singular form of the negative verb.
  • ajattelee → ajattele (connegative form, without the personal ending).
  • itseään liikaa stays the same.
What is the difference between ajatella and miettiä in a sentence like this?

Both ajatella and miettiä relate to thinking, but they have slightly different typical uses:

  • ajatella – to think (have in mind, think about something/someone; also to have an opinion)
  • miettiä – to think about something more deliberately, to ponder, to consider

Your sentence:

  • Hän ajattelee itseään liikaa.
    He/She thinks about themself too much.
    (General, ongoing tendency, self‑focused thinking.)

You could also say:

  • Hän miettii itseään liikaa.

This is grammatically correct, but it can sound a bit like:

  • He/She ponders themself too much,
    i.e. there is a flavor of analyzing/reflecting on oneself excessively.

In everyday language for this “self‑centered / always thinking of themself” idea, ajatella is the more natural default choice.