bootstrap
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
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“I figured we can absolutely bootstrap this with no corporate background, just hard work and the American dream, we’ll work 80-plus hours a week, we’ll make it happen,” Lieu said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 30, 2026
One promising strategy is known as the "bootstrap" approach.
From Science Daily ● May 19, 2026
SilverSneakers represents just a small slice of that — the costs are not broken out by MedPAC — but it’s significant enough that the bootstrap venture has turned into a big business.
From MarketWatch ● Nov. 5, 2025
I think she is deeply wrong to let the tobacco company bootstrap these gas stations onto their suit.
From Slate ● Jun. 20, 2025
A person who pulls himself up from a low environment via the bootstrap route has two choices.
From "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" by Betty Smith
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“You should apply if you want to build yourself up while also building a startup society that bootstraps other startup societies,” its website said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 1, 2026
He had no experience in elected office, no notable history of activist organizing, no college degree, no significant success in the private sector, not even a record of pulling himself up by his proverbial bootstraps.
From Slate ● Jul. 8, 2026
Pulling up your bootstraps and spraying some tough on it is important.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 3, 2025
Some are goofily anachronistic, as when Johnson mutters a few times about pulling himself up by his bootstraps like everyone else.
From Salon ● Mar. 15, 2024
Teachers exhorted us to be like him, to lift ourselves from poverty by our bootstraps.
From "Kaffir Boy: An Autobiography" by Mark Mathabane
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But he’s bootstrapped himself into intelligence and with savvy networking and know-how, he becomes indispensable to the British, volunteering as a major to survey land and negotiate treaties with the Native tribes and French army.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 2, 2026
Migrating to another cloud provider or implementing a multi-cloud strategy would likely be too costly for a bootstrapped startup like his.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 22, 2025
Directed by and starring Morgan Spurlock, the bootstrapped, lo-fi documentary was a smash hit, grossing more than $22 million on a $65,000 budget.
From New York Times ● May 12, 2024
But many of these smaller livestream channels are more bootstrapped operations, adherent to the same grind culture their content facilitates.
From Slate ● Sep. 2, 2023
“When we first started during the pandemic, we were entirely bootstrapped and still working other full-time jobs, while doing our best to keep up with the growth of Locale,” Clark said.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 29, 2022
Just like Donald Trump, also the son of a bootstrapping developer, the Kushner boys talk of visiting building sites as children with their father, Charlie.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 15, 2026
Putting aside the chutzpah of the bootstrapping, it’s not clear that the court is wrong.
From Slate ● Jun. 30, 2026
It brought the bootstrapping fantasy of this rising family, a few generations removed from the toiling class, into Britain’s living rooms with the right blend of serious theatricality and soapy splendor.
From Salon ● Mar. 28, 2026
It’s a quintessential American story, of bootstrapping from the humblest of origins to the literal highest of heights.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 14, 2023
He had worked as a printer but was now bootstrapping his own print shop on a shoestring, and became entirely self-employed.
From How and When to Be Your Own Doctor by Steve Solomon