Learn Hardcore Portuguese (Portugal): Se continuares a respeitar esses limites, o teu corpo há de agradecer mais tarde. - If you continue to respect those limits, your body will surely thank you later.

Because this is a conditional sentence about the future, and after se in this kind of clause Portuguese normally uses the future subjunctive, not the present indicative.

Present indicative (tu): tu continuas – “you continue”
Future subjunctive (tu): tu continuares – used after se, quando, etc., when talking about a possible future situation.

So:

Se continuares a respeitar… ≈ “If you keep respecting…” / “If you continue to respect…”
Using Se continuas a respeitar… would sound wrong in standard European Portuguese in this context.

Is continuares an infinitive or a subjunctive form?

Formally, continuares looks like the personal infinitive and the future subjunctive – they share the same endings. Here, however, it is clearly the future subjunctive, because:

It comes right after se in a conditional clause about the future.
That’s the classic context where Portuguese uses future subjunctive.

So you can think of it as:

(Quando / Se) tu continuares… → “(When / If) you continue…” (in the future)

The personal infinitive would show up in structures like:

Para tu continuares a respeitar… – “For you to keep respecting…”

Same form, different function; the se + [form] pattern here strongly points to future subjunctive.

Why is it a respeitar and not something like respeitando?

European Portuguese usually prefers “a + infinitive” to express an ongoing/continuous action, where English often uses “-ing”:

continuar a respeitar ≈ “to continue respecting / to keep respecting”

In European Portuguese:

Estou a ler – “I am reading”
Continuas a trabalhar – “You keep working”

This “a + infinitive” construction feels much more natural than respeitando here.
Respeitando exists (it’s the gerund) but in European Portuguese it is rarer and tends to sound:

more formal or literary, or
used in very specific structures (e.g., at the start of a sentence: Respeitando estes limites, evitarás problemas.)

So Se continuares a respeitar esses limites… is the natural everyday way to say “If you keep respecting those limits…” in Portugal.

What’s the difference between esses limites, estes limites, and aqueles limites?

These are all ways to say “these/those limits,” but the nuance is about distance and reference.

estes limites – “these limits”
- Close to the speaker, or something just mentioned.
esses limites – “those limits”
- Close to the listener, or something the other person has in mind / has just referred to.
aqueles limites – “those limits (over there)”
- Far from both speaker and listener, or more removed/abstract.

In practice, esses limites often means:

“those limits we’ve been talking about” or “those limits you know/are dealing with.”

So in context, esses limites is “those (particular) limits we both know about (especially you).”

Why is it o teu corpo and not just teu corpo?

In European Portuguese, it’s very common (almost default) to use a definite article before a possessive:

o teu corpo – literally “the your body”
a tua casa – “your house”
os teus amigos – “your friends”

Leaving out the article:

teu corpo, tua casa – is possible, but sounds more literary, poetic, or emphatic, and in everyday speech it can sound a bit marked or old-fashioned.

So:

o teu corpo is the normal, neutral way to say “your body” in European Portuguese.

Why is it teu and not seu? Isn’t seu also “your”?

Both teu and seu can translate as “your”, but they match different pronouns and levels of formality:

teu / tua / teus / tuas
- Used with tu (informal “you”, singular).
- Common among friends, family, people your own age, etc.
seu / sua / seus / suas
- Used with ele/ela (his/her) or with você (formal or semi-formal “you”), and also with o senhor / a senhora.

Since the sentence has continuares (the tu form of the future subjunctive), it must stay consistent:

Se continuares a respeitar esses limites, o teu corpo… (informal tu)
More formal with você would be:
- Se continuar a respeitar esses limites, o seu corpo…

So teu matches tu in this informal context.

What does the structure há de agradecer mean exactly?

Há de + infinitive is built from:

haver in the present (há) + de
- infinitive (agradecer)

Meaning and nuance:

It usually means something like “will (certainly) do X”, often with a sense of:
- inevitability, or
- firm expectation, or
- mild reassurance.

So o teu corpo há de agradecer mais tarde is roughly:

“your body will (surely) thank you later”
“your body will thank you for it later, you’ll see”

In tone, há de can sound:

slightly formal or literary, or
reassuring/encouraging in spoken language.

In everyday informal speech, many people would also say:

o teu corpo vai agradecer – “your body is going to thank you”
o teu corpo agradecerá – “your body will thank you” (more formal/written)

What is the subject of há de agradecer? Why is there no explicit pronoun?

The subject is o teu corpo.

Portuguese often doesn’t repeat the subject if it’s clear from context, especially when it was just mentioned before the verb:

O teu corpo há de agradecer mais tarde.
(Subject = o teu corpo)

In the actual sentence, the structure is:

Se continuares a respeitar esses limites, o teu corpo há de agradecer mais tarde.

So the subject o teu corpo is right before há de agradecer; there is no need for a pronoun like ele.

You could, grammatically, say:

Ele há de agradecer mais tarde. – “It will thank you later.”

But here, naming o teu corpo is clearer and more natural.

Could we also say vai agradecer or agradecerá instead of há de agradecer? Is there any difference?

Yes, you can. All three express a future idea, but with slightly different tone:

há de agradecer
- “will surely/definitely thank (you)”
- Feels a bit reassuring, sometimes slightly formal or literary, but still used in speech.
vai agradecer
- “is going to thank (you)”
- Very common and colloquial; neutral in spoken language.
agradecerá
- “will thank (you)” (simple future)
- Often sounds more formal or written; less frequent in casual speech.

All are grammatically correct. In a relaxed conversation in Portugal, vai agradecer or há de agradecer would be the most likely choices, depending on the speaker’s style.

If I want to be formal and avoid tu, how would I change the sentence?

To be more formal (for example, speaking to a stranger or someone older), you’d normally switch to você or o senhor / a senhora, and adjust the verb and possessive:

A common formal-ish version with você:

Se continuar a respeitar esses limites, o seu corpo há de agradecer mais tarde.

Changes:

continuares (tu) → continuar (você / o senhor / a senhora take 3rd-person forms)
teu corpo → seu corpo to match você or o senhor / a senhora.

You can also keep há de agradecer or switch to vai agradecer depending on how formal or casual you want to sound.

How would I explicitly say “your body will thank you for it later” in Portuguese?

To add “you” (the person being thanked) and the idea of “for it,” you might say:

Se continuares a respeitar esses limites, o teu corpo há de agradecer-te por isso mais tarde.

Breakdown:

agradecer-te – “to thank you” (-te = object pronoun for tu)
por isso – “for that / for it”

In spoken European Portuguese, word order often shifts the pronoun:

o teu corpo há de te agradecer por isso mais tarde.

Both:

agradecer-te (clitic after the infinitive) and
te agradecer (pronoun before the infinitive or after the finite verb)

are used, but te agradecer after há de is very natural in speech:

o teu corpo há de te agradecer por isso mais tarde.

Can mais tarde be moved to another place in the sentence?

Yes. Mais tarde (“later”) is quite flexible in position. All of these are possible:

Se continuares a respeitar esses limites, o teu corpo há de agradecer mais tarde.
Se continuares a respeitar esses limites, mais tarde o teu corpo há de agradecer.
Mais tarde, se continuares a respeitar esses limites, o teu corpo há de agradecer.

The meaning doesn’t really change; it always means “later (on) your body will thank you.”
The first version (with mais tarde at the end) is probably the most natural and common.