Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use aspire in a sentence

40 example sentences · verb

Aspire means to have a strong desire or ambition to achieve something. Example: “He aspires to become a successful doctor.”

Examples of aspire by meaning

verbTo have a strong desire or ambition to achieve something.

  • He aspires to become a successful doctor.
  • We aspire that the world will be a better place.
  • We were maids and farmers, handymen and washerwomen, and anything higher that we aspired to was farcical and presumptuous.1969, Maya Angelou, chapter 23, in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, New York: Random House, pages 177–178

verbTo move upward; to be very tall.

  • There is a moonshaped rictus in the streetlamp’s globe where a stone has gone and from this aperture there drifts down through the constant helix of aspiring insects a faint and steady rain of the same forms burnt and lifeless.1979, Cormac McCarthy, Suttree, New York: Vintage, published 1992, page 4

More sentences with aspire

  • My son finished law last month, and now aspires to public office.From the entry public office
  • Jason aspires to be one of the 45 orientation program surveillants.From the entry surveillant
  • They were affluent, but aspired to true wealth.From the entry affluent
  • Many of those that envy celebrities aspire to celebrity themselves.From the entry celebrity
  • They had achieved affluence, but aspired to true wealth.From the entry affluence
  • In French, an aspired h forestalls elision.From the entry forestall
  • The sermon's theme is that we are all fallen angels and should aspire to regain full glory in heaven.From the entry fallen angel
  • They aspired to circumaviate the globe.From the entry globe
  • They aspired to circumnavigate the Globe.From the entry globe
  • They aspired to replicate the Globe.From the entry globe
  • The preponderance of the population can aspire to high-tier normiedom at best.2026 March 7, Becca Rothfeld, “The Captivating Derangement of the Looksmaxxing Movement”, in The New Yorker, New York, N.Y.: Condé Nast…. From the entry True Adam
  • In short, polyworkers don't aspire to a single job in their field.2022 February 14, Stephen Moore, “Side hustle and 'polywork' culture is really just a desperate reflection of a low-paying job market”, in…. From the entry polyworker
  • Have you aspired (at a distance) to be a Settler of Catan?2019, Jessica Misener, JOMO: Celebrate the Joy of Missing Out!, Adams Media, →ISBN, page 51. From the entry Settler of Catan
  • Beyond Baroque, she says, “was the big magilla” to which they all aspired.2018 November 13, Bliss Bowen, “This weekend’s Southern California Poetry Festival caps Beyond Baroque’s 50th anniversary celebration and…. From the entry magilla
  • And further, I don't see anything in American life – for myself – to aspire to.2014, James Baldwin, James Baldwin: The Last Interview: and other Conversations, →ISBN. From the entry plastic
  • We cannot aspire to attain such knowledge on our own and it has to be engifted.2014, Eugene G Breen, The Human Mind and Belief II - Unplugged, →ISBN. From the entry engift
  • Even if people pay out the Easties, they still aspire to live among them.2012 May 11, Judith Ireland, “Poor on the north shore ... or six degrees of separation”, in Sydney Morning Herald. From the entry eastie
  • As President he aspired to much that went unfulfilled during his two terms in office.1993, Glenn A. Phelps, George Washington and American Constitutionalism (American Political Thought), Lawrence, Kan.: University Press of…. From the entry unintention
  • He's a self-satisfied klutz who aspires to be a con artist. . . .1988 December 14, Vincent Canby, “Movie Review: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”, in New York Times, retrieved 25 May 2016. From the entry small change
  • The cheese aspired to dizzy gustorial heights in the mouths of campus fromagophiles.1969 April 18, Clay G. Greighbome, “In the mouths of fromagophiles”, in The Observer, page 7, column 4. From the entry fromagophile
  • Travis aspires to be the Leslie Knope of his community, finding the grace of working together to accomplish meaningful things.2022, Arthur Stewart, Stephanie Kendell Kendell, editor, Are You Still Watching?: Using Pop Culture to Tune In, Find God, and Get Renewed…. From the entry Leslie Knope
  • Does that ridiculous person aspire to esteem?2018, Stendhal, Racine and Shakespeare, Alma Books, →ISBN, page 152. From the entry ridiculous
  • In fact, hate-watching is a byproduct of a spoiled culture, awash in choices and television that aspires to greatness.2013 February 24, Christopher Borrelli, “What does hate-watching mean?”, in Chicago Tribune. From the entry hate-watching
  • How did Playboy happen to' aspire toward pimpdom's lush heights?2009, Caryl Chessman, Cell 2455, Death Row: A Condemned Man's Own Story - Page 95. From the entry pimpdom
  • Because small slaveholders aspired to be planters, they did not often align themselves with the political and economic interests of nonslaveholders.2003, Wilma P. Dunaway, Slavery in the American Mountain South, page 9. From the entry smallholder
  • There is no womanly translation of guy and yet most women I know aspire to a certain level of guyhood.2000, Robert A. Schwegler, Patterns of Exposition 16, page 422. From the entry guyhood
  • My favourite subculture, that I eventually aspire to be a part of (both in my designs and in the way I dress) is Mori Kei.2013 March, Mariam Armisen, quoting Stéphane Aurore Koné, “On Embracing Quirkiness”, in Q Zine, number 8, page 59. From the entry mori kei
  • When a karate student is a white belt, the student aspires to be a black belt, the top color of karate belts, someday.2011, Annemarie Algeo, Fat, Fit, and (Almost) Fifty, page 35. From the entry white belt
  • Only surplus plonk and cooking wine would aspire to fall in this segment, which can be blended with any other wine - to any extent.1998, Pierre Spahni, Swiss Wine Market Report, page 95. From the entry plonk
  • Basically, the New Lad aspires to New Man status when he's with women, but reverts to Old Lad type when he's out with the boys.1991 May/June, Sean O'Hagan, “The Reinvented Man”, in Arena, page 22. From the entry new lad
  • Ultimately, Nicholas aspired to a pan-Serb ideal, desiring nothing less than the resurrection of the medieval Serb empire with himself upon Dusan's throne.1983, John D Treadway, The Falcon and the Eagle, page 8. From the entry pan-Serb
  • Time was, the author assures us, "when no gallant knight or gentle dame could aspire to good breeding unless perfectly conversant with floriography."1965, The Illustrated London News, volume 246, number 2, London: Illustrated London News and Sketch, →OCLC, page xvi, column 2. From the entry floriography
  • Hatred of baroque pretentiosity and the feeling that the ode-writers aspired too high produced many parodic odes in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.1949, Gilbert Highet, The Classical Tradition: Greek and Roman Influences on Western Literature, Oxford: at the Clarendon Press, page 638. From the entry pretentiosity
  • Lester was in the thick of social and commercial affairs; he walked in paths to which Jennie's retiring soul had never aspired.1911, Theodore Dreiser, chapter LX, in Jennie Gerhardt. From the entry retiring
  • It aspires to being a modernized fairy tale, in which the wonderment and joy are retained and the heart-aches and nightmares are left out.1900 April, L[yman] Frank Baum, “Introduction”, in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Chicago, Ill.; New York, N.Y.: Geo[rge] M[elvin] Hill Co.…. From the entry heart-ache
  • And with Mai's new connections to draw on, he might even aspire to a post in one of the new scriveneries attached to the Inns of Court.2012, Anne Lyle, The Alchemist of Souls, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire: Angry Robot, →ISBN, page 93. From the entry scrivenery

Meaning of aspire

  1. verb To have a strong desire or ambition to achieve something.
  2. verb To go as high as, to reach the top of (something).
  3. verb To move upward; to be very tall.

Full definition of aspire

Questions about aspire in a sentence

How do you use aspire in a sentence?
Aspire is used as a verb. For example: “He aspires to become a successful doctor.”
What is a short sentence with aspire?
“They aspired to circumaviate the globe.”
What does aspire mean?
Aspire means to have a strong desire or ambition to achieve something.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: aspire (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use aspire in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/aspire. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.