Breakdown of Él está indeciso y no sabe qué hacer con su vocación.
él
he
y
and
no
no, not
estar
to be (location/state)
su
his/her/its/their/your (formal)
qué
what
con
with
hacer
to do / to make
saber
to know (facts) / to hear from (someone)
indeciso
undecided
la vocación
vocation / calling
Questions & Answers about Él está indeciso y no sabe qué hacer con su vocación.
Why does this sentence use qué hacer instead of conjugating the verb like qué hace?
This is an indirect question using a question word (qué) followed by an infinitive (hacer). In Spanish, when you talk about knowing, wondering, or deciding what to do, where to go, etc., and the person doing the action doesn't change, you use the infinitive. Since he is the one who doesn't know what he should do, we use qué hacer.
Since this isn't a direct question, why does qué have an accent mark?
Even though there are no question marks, qué hacer is an indirect question (he doesn't know the answer to the question: what should I do?). In Spanish, question words like qué, cómo, cuándo, and dónde always keep their accent marks when used in indirect questions.
Could I say Él es indeciso instead of Él está indeciso?
You could, but it changes the meaning! Using está means he is currently in a state of indecision about this specific situation (his vocation). If you use es, you are describing a personality trait, meaning he is an indecisive person in general.
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