Learn Hardcore Portuguese (Portugal): Essa conclusão ajuda-me a ver o progresso e a corrigir erros. - That conclusion helps me see the progress and correct mistakes.

essa conclusão
- Literally that conclusion.
- In European Portuguese, essa often refers to something that is:
  - linked to the listener (your conclusion / the one you just mentioned), or
  - already present in the discourse (the conclusion we’ve just been talking about).
- So Essa conclusão ajuda-me… tends to feel like “That conclusion (you/we just reached) helps me…”.
esta conclusão
- Literally this conclusion.
- More closely associated with the speaker, or with something very “here and now”.
- You might say Esta conclusão ajuda-me… if you’re emphasizing “this conclusion I’ve just drawn myself”.
a conclusão
- Literally the conclusion, with no “this/that” flavour.
- Just identifies it as a specific, known conclusion: A conclusão ajuda-me… = “The conclusion helps me…”.

In real-life European Portuguese, essa and esta often overlap, and many speakers don’t strictly follow the distance rule. All three options would be understood; it’s more a matter of nuance and style than right vs. wrong.

Why is it ajuda-me and not ajuda me? What is the hyphen doing?

In European Portuguese, unstressed object pronouns like me, te, se, nos, vos, o, a, lhe are normally attached to the verb in writing when they come after it. This is called enclisis.

ajuda-me = ajuda (helps) + me (me)
The hyphen shows that me is cliticised to the verb and pronounced as one unit: ajuda‑me.

Writing ajuda me (without a hyphen) is considered incorrect in standard orthography. Whenever the pronoun comes after a finite verb in European Portuguese, you should generally use:

verb + hyphen + pronoun:
- ajuda-me, ajuda-te, ajuda-nos, ajuda-o, etc.

With infinitives and gerunds, the pattern is the same:

ajudar-me, corrigir-te, vendo-o, etc.

Why do Europeans say ajuda-me but Brazilians say me ajuda? Which is right?

Both are right, but they follow different default patterns in the two varieties:

European Portuguese (PT-PT)
- In affirmative main clauses, the default is pronoun after the verb (enclisis):
  - Essa conclusão ajuda-me a ver…
- The pronoun moves before the verb (proclisis) only when something “pulls” it forward, such as:
  - negation: Essa conclusão não me ajuda…
  - certain adverbs: Essa conclusão já me ajuda…
  - question words, relative pronouns, etc.
Brazilian Portuguese (PT-BR)
- The default is the opposite: pronoun before the verb (proclisis), even in simple affirmatives:
  - Essa conclusão me ajuda a ver…
- Saying ajuda-me in Brazil sounds very formal or archaic in speech.

So:

In Portugal, ajuda-me is the regular, natural form here.
In Brazil, me ajuda is the regular form.

Why is there an a before ver and corrigir? Is it like “to see / to correct”?

Yes. In this structure, a is a preposition that works similarly to English “to” before a verb:

ajudar alguém a fazer alguma coisa
→ to help someone to do something

In your sentence:

ajuda-me a ver = helps me to see
ajuda-me a corrigir = helps me to correct

So the pattern is:

ajudar + (object) + a + infinitive

While you may occasionally see ajudar + infinitive without a, in careful European Portuguese, ajudar a + infinitive is the standard construction.

Do I have to repeat a before corrigir? Could I say ajuda-me a ver o progresso e corrigir erros?

Both versions are grammatically acceptable:

Essa conclusão ajuda-me a ver o progresso e a corrigir erros.
Essa conclusão ajuda-me a ver o progresso e corrigir erros.

The difference is stylistic:

Repeating a (version 1)
- Sounds a bit more careful and balanced, especially in writing.
- Makes it clear that a ver and a corrigir are two parallel actions.
Not repeating a (version 2)
- Is very common in speech and also accepted in writing.
- Slightly more compact and informal in feel.

Meaning-wise, they’re the same: the conclusion helps you both to see the progress and to correct errors.

Why do we have o progresso with a definite article, but just erros without an article?

This shows two different typical patterns in Portuguese:

o progresso
- The article o marks it as specific / identifiable:
  - “the progress” (usually your progress in something known from context).
- Portuguese uses definite articles with abstract nouns much more than English:
  - o amor, a felicidade, o progresso.
erros (no article)
- Without an article, it’s more generic or indefinite:
  - “errors / mistakes (in general)”, not a particular, previously defined set.

So the sentence suggests:

You can see the (your/our) progress (a specific, ongoing thing), and
You can correct errors in general (not necessarily a fixed list of errors).

Could I say corrigir os erros instead of corrigir erros? Would the meaning change?

Yes, you can, and the difference is subtle:

corrigir erros
- More generic: correcting mistakes in general.
- Focus on the activity or ability: “to correct errors (as they appear)”.
corrigir os erros
- More specific: “to correct the errors”, usually ones that:
  - you have already made, or
  - are known from the context.

So:

Essa conclusão ajuda-me a ver o progresso e a corrigir erros.
→ That conclusion helps me, in general, to correct mistakes I make.
Essa conclusão ajuda-me a ver o progresso e a corrigir os erros.
→ That conclusion helps me to correct those errors (the ones we know I’ve made).

Both are fine; choose depending on how specific you want to be.

Why is there no subject pronoun like ela or isso before ajuda?

In Portuguese, you don’t repeat a pronoun when the subject is already expressed by a noun phrase:

Subject: Essa conclusão
Verb: ajuda
Object: me

The subject is clear from Essa conclusão, so adding ela would be redundant:

✅ Essa conclusão ajuda-me a ver…
❌ Essa conclusão ela ajuda-me a ver… (only used for very strong emphasis, and sounds odd in most contexts)

Also, Portuguese often drops subject pronouns when the verb form already shows who the subject is (especially with personal pronouns like eu, tu, ele etc.). Here, the subject noun phrase is explicit, so you don’t need any pronoun at all.

Can I change the word order, like Essa conclusão ajuda-me a corrigir erros e a ver o progresso, or use para mim instead of me?

Some changes are natural; others are not:

Reordering the two actions is fine:
- ✅ Essa conclusão ajuda-me a corrigir erros e a ver o progresso.
  Meaning is the same; you’re just mentioning correcting errors before seeing progress.
Replacing me with para mim is not equivalent here:
- ❌ Essa conclusão ajuda a ver o progresso e a corrigir erros para mim.
  This sounds unnatural; para mim would not play the same grammatical role as me.
  In Portuguese, ajudar-me a… is the standard way to say “help me to …”:
- me is a direct/indirect object pronoun, not a prepositional phrase.

So you should keep the clitic pronoun attached to ajuda in European Portuguese, and you may reorder the two infinitive clauses if you like.

How do you pronounce “Essa conclusão ajuda-me a ver o progresso e a corrigir erros” in European Portuguese?

Approximate European Portuguese pronunciation (simplified):

Essa → roughly “EH-sɐ” (stress on E; final -a is very short, like a weak “uh”)
conclusão → “kõ-klu-ZÃW̃”
- ç = /s/
- final -ão is a nasal sound (like English “own” but through the nose)
ajuda-me → “ɐ-ZU-dɐ-mɨ”
- j = /ʒ/, like the s in “measure”
- final -e in me = very short, like a reduced “uh”
a ver → “ɐ VEHR” (short a, stress on ver)
o progresso → “u pru-GRE-su”
- standalone o is pronounced like “oo”
- ss = /s/
e a corrigir → “i ɐ ko-ʁi-ZEER”
- rr in corri- is a strong, throaty r (uvular)
erros → “EH-ʁuʃ”
- final -s often sounds like English “sh” in European Portuguese.

Spoken smoothly, it flows as:

“EH-sɐ kõ-klu-ZÃW̃ ɐ-ZU-dɐ-mɨ ɐ VEHR u pru-GRE-su i ɐ ko-ʁi-ZEER EH-ʁuʃ.”

Listening to native audio will help you fix the rhythm and the characteristic Portuguese r and nasal ão.