If you do something with yourself like you wake yourself up you should use a reflexive verb. If you make an action on someone like you wake someone up use not a reflexive verb,. If something happens on its own you have to use a reflexive verb. That's shortly. Mi alzo ogni giorno alle 6 di mattina. - You wake up at six every morning Alzo ???? ogni giorno alle 6 di mattina - who do you wake up every morning? Your mum, dad , brother, boyfriend , husband?

Part 2/2 It is maybe useful to point out that, while the morphology we're discussing applies to all pronominal verbs of Italian, as soon as one leaves the context of reflexive and reciprocal verbs, the semantics of the personal pronouns accompanying the pronominal verb changes, so that, even when a correspondent active verb exists, no semantic relationship between it and the pronominal verb can be inferred based on the morphological similarity: sometimes the two meanings are very similar, sometimes they are quite different. Examples: 10) 'arrivare' <-> 'arrivarci' 11) 'pigliare' <-> 'pigliarci' 12) 'essere' <-> 'esserci' 13) 'spuntare' <-> 'spuntarla' 14) 'bere' <-> 'bersi' 15) 'stare' <-> 'starci' 16) 'scappare' <-> 'scapparci' 17) 'dare' <-> 'darsele' 18) 'squagliare' <-> 'squagliarsi' 19) 'intendere' <-> 'intendersi'.

About your question "But why " Fa ginnastica." ? (Because to do a exercise must by myself?)" The reason "fare ginnastica" is not a reflexive verb is that: 1) the direct object of 'fare' is taken ('ginnastica'), therefore a direct reflexive verb isn't possible, because Italian doesn't comprise double direct object constructions ("* mi faccio ginnastica", where 'mi' would be the direct object as in "mi lavo": ) 2) we don't say "fare ginnastica a qualcuno", therefore an indirect reflexive verb isn't possible either ("* mi faccio ginnastica", where 'mi' would be the indirect object, as in "mi lavo i denti"). Maybe you're confused, because the answers you received led you to think that we always use a reflexive verb when we do something which concerns ourselves. This is not the case. For a reflexive form of a verb to exist, I'd say that, with reference to the relevant meaning of the verb, two conditions must be satisfied:: – the meaning is transitive – the subject of the verb can also be its direct object (direct reflexive verbs, eg "mi lavo") or its indirect object (indirect reflexive verbs, eg "mi lavo le mani"). In other words, a reflexive verb is nothing more than a specific scenario in the overall usage of a transitive verb, namely the one in which the subject is also either the direct object or the indirect object: when this happens, the personal pronoun expressing that object is chosen in the reflexive series, that's to say mi/ti/si/ci/vi/si. That's all. :-) One last thing. The meaning of the verb (the meaning you are interested in, if there is more than one) must be compatible with the double role of the subject, and I'm under the impression that usage plays a role here. For example, we say "Interpreterò Amleto" ("I will play Hamlet"), but, with this meaning, usually we say "interpreterò me stesso" instead of "mi interpreterò". All I wrote goes for reciprocal verbs, too.

Hello Dorothy I had to split this in two parts. I'm sorry. Part 1/2 I'd say that 'alzarsi' isn't a good choice for your question, because there is no active counterpart: you can use 'alzarsi' to say that you get out of your bed, but you can't use 'alzare' to mean that you make somebody "get out of her/his bed". The latter would sound weird, unless the context made it clear that the person you're talking about is physically unable to get out of a bed or you specified "dal letto" and the meaning would be different. A couple of corresponding verbs is 'lavarsi' / 'lavare [qualcuno]'. 1) "Mi sono lavato poco fa" -> lavarsi 2) "Andrea si laverà dopo" -> lavarsi 3) "Lavi tu i bambini?" -> lavare. When the direct object [qualcuno] is expressed by means of the pronominal series mi/ti/(lo, la)/ci/vi/(li, le), sentences which use 'lavare [qualcuno]' resemble the ones which use 'lavarsi' (whose pronominal series is mi/ti/si/ci/vi/si), but the verb is 'lavarsi' only when the subject of the sentence and the person referred to by the pronoun are the same. Here come a few examples which use the couple 'lavarsi'/'lavare'. 4) "Mi laverò dopo" -> io - mi -> lavarsi 5) "Lavati!" -> tu - ti -> lavarsi 6) "Lo lavi tu?" -> tu - lo -> lavare 7) "Chi lo lava?" -> <unknown 3rd person singular subject> - lo -> lavare 8) "Chi si lava adesso?" -> <unknown 3rd person singular subject> - si -> lavarsi (it suffices that 'si' be used) 9) "Non è vero: ci laviamo tutti i giorni!" -> noi - ci -> lavarsi.

As a general rule, you have to use the reflexive form if the subject and the object of an action are the same. e.g. verb = alzare I get up = io mi alzo (you are the the one who's getting up) I raise my hand = io alzo la mia mano (you - subject - and your hand - object - are different) Moreover, you cannot say "alzo ogni giorno alle 6 di mattina", because the object of the verb "alzare" is missing (it must be specified either using the reflexive form or a valid object) I hope I made myself clear. Let me know if you need any help :)