Word.ws English Dictionary

one's got to do what one's got to do

one's got to do what one's got to do phrase: a person must do what they feel is necessary or imperative.

Phrase

one's got to do what one's got to do

  1. (informal) A person must do what they feel is necessary or imperative.
    • Sometimes a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do, even if his helpmate does not share his passion. Perhaps that's part of the attraction. Maybe a man wouldn't be so feverish about his garden if he had to share it with his partner, […]2000, Warren Schultz, A Man's Garden, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, →ISBN, →OCLC

Forms of one's got to do what one's got to do

alternative formone's gotta do what one's gotta do
alternative forma man's gotta do what a man's gotta do

Questions about one's got to do what one's got to do

What does one's got to do what one's got to do mean?
One's got to do what one's got to do means a person must do what they feel is necessary or imperative.
What part of speech is one's got to do what one's got to do?
One's got to do what one's got to do is a phrase.

Words near one's got to do what one's got to do in the dictionary

  1. one's father was born before one
  2. one's fill
  3. one's fingers are all thumbs
  4. one's fingers itch
  5. one's flabber is gasted
  6. one's got to do what one's got to do
  7. one's gotta do what one's gotta do
  8. one's head off
  9. one's heart bleeds
  10. one's heart in one's mouth
  11. one's heart in one's throat

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: one's got to do what one's got to do (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Sapaa-one's got to do what one's got to do.wav.

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