Miettiessä

Miettiessä is a Finnish non-finite verb form derived from the verb miettiä, meaning to think or to consider. It functions as a present active participle in the inessive form and is used to express that thinking or pondering happens at the same time as another action in the main clause. In English, it is commonly rendered as “while thinking” or “in thinking.”

Form and variation: The participle is built with the stem mietti- plus the inessive suffix -essä, and it can take possessive or person-specific endings to reflect the subject. The basic form miettiessä is used when the subject is not explicitly stated. If the subject is explicit, related forms appear, such as miettiessään (while he/she was thinking), miettiessäni (while I was thinking), or miettiessäsi (while you were thinking). These forms function as adverbial participles, linking actions in a sentence.

Usage: Miettiessä is most common in written Finnish and in contexts that aim for a precise or reflective tone. It conveys simultaneity of actions and can set the background or frame for the main clause, much like subordinate clauses introduced by when or while in English. The form often replaces less formal phrases such as “kun ajattelin” or “miettiessä, että …” with a more compact, stylistically nuanced expression.

Examples:

- Miettiessäni, mitä sanoa, jäin sanattomaksi.

- Hän miettiessään vaihtoehtoja päätti tehdä uuden suunnitelman.

- Keskustelun aikana hän miettiessään tilannetta sai paremman käsityksen siitä, mihin suuntaan mennä.

See also: miettiä, mietintä, pohdiskella.