Español — seguir/continuar + gerund
The construction seguir or continuar + gerund expresses that an action keeps going: Sigo estudiando means "I'm still studying". To express the opposite — stopping an action — Spanish uses dejar de + infinitive, as in Dejé de estudiar ("I stopped studying").
How it works
Conjugate seguir (or the more formal continuar) and add the gerund of the main verb: Sigo trabajando ("I keep working"), Seguimos esperando ("we're still waiting"), Continúa lloviendo ("it goes on raining"). The gerund stays invariable; only seguir/continuar carries person and tense: Seguí estudiando all night.
Examples
| Spanish | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Sigo estudiando | I'm still studying (continuing) |
| Sigue lloviendo | It keeps raining |
| Seguimos esperando | We're still waiting |
| Continúa trabajando | He/she goes on working (formal) |
| Seguí estudiando toda la noche | I kept studying all night (past) |
| Dejé de estudiar | I stopped studying (dejar de + infinitive) |
Good to know
Note the two structures differ: continuation takes a gerund (seguir/continuar + gerundio, e.g. Sigo comiendo), but stopping takes an infinitive (dejar de + infinitivo, e.g. Dejé de comer). A common mistake is *dejé de comiendo — dejar de never takes a gerund. Also, seguir + gerund cannot express the future start of an action; it only reports one already underway.