{"id":63,"date":"2019-04-17T12:30:38","date_gmt":"2019-04-17T12:30:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/zyle\/?p=63"},"modified":"2021-03-23T04:57:11","modified_gmt":"2021-03-23T04:57:11","slug":"i-wish-if-only","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/grammar\/i-wish-if-only.htm","title":{"rendered":"I wish &#038; if only &#8211; English grammar courses"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>For this lesson, we will learn about the expressions \u201cI wish\u201d and \u201cif only\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>These two expressions are used in different forms to express wish, regret or complaint.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>How to express wish or desire<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In this case, both expressions \u201cI wish\u201d and \u201cif only\u201d are used by having the following verb change to the past simple tense. The past tense, for these phrases, is not viewed literally as the past and is actually used to express a wish in the present or the future. For example:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I wish I knew how to speak British English.<\/li>\n<li>If only you didn\u2019t live far away.<\/li>\n<li>I wish I were a billionaire.<\/li>\n<li>If only I didn\u2019t eat that meal.<\/li>\n<li>I wish I could play the piano.<\/li>\n<li>If only we could go to the beach today.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>When the verb is \u2018To be\u2019 and the subject is \u2018I\u2019 we use \u2018I were\u2019 instead of \u2018I was\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>How to express regret<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In this case, the expressions are followed by past perfect. We use it to express a regret of something we didn\u2019t do in the past.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I wish I had known the answer.<\/li>\n<li>If only you had been present.<\/li>\n<li>I wish he had given me a call.<\/li>\n<li>If only we had met sooner instead of later.<\/li>\n<li>I wish they had stayed open for longer.<\/li>\n<li>If only we had more things to do.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>How to express complaint<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In this case, we express our complaining about a behaviour or dissatisfaction about something. It\u2019s formed using the modal \u2018would\u2019 +verb.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I wish you would work hard for your exams.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 If only you would stop crying!<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I wish he would explain more about his courses.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 If only she would stop taking my stuff.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I wish they would stop making so much noise.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 If only you would come.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Let\u2019s do some exercises with what we have learned already.<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Create two sentences expressing wish using both the \u201cI wish\u201d and \u201cif only\u201d phrases.<\/li>\n<li>Create two sentences expressing regret using both the \u201cI wish\u201d and \u201cif only\u201d phrases.<\/li>\n<li>Create two sentences expressing complaint using both the \u201cI wish\u201d and \u201cif only\u201d phrases.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For this lesson, we will learn about the expressions \u201cI wish\u201d and \u201cif only\u201d. These two expressions are used in different forms to express wish, regret or complaint. How to express wish or desire In this case, both expressions \u201cI wish\u201d and \u201cif only\u201d are used by having the following verb change to the past &#8230; <a title=\"I wish &#038; if only &#8211; English grammar courses\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/grammar\/i-wish-if-only.htm\" aria-label=\"Read more about I wish &#038; if only &#8211; English grammar courses\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-63","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-grammar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65,"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63\/revisions\/65"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/youlearnenglish.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}