work one's way

Exert oneself to proceed in a particular direction; also, finance a project by working. For example, The painters are working their way from the top floor to the basement, or I'm trying to work my way into the publishing world, or She's working her way through college. [Second half of 1800s]

Common Names:

Name	Pronounced	Usage
Brynn	BRIN	English (Modern)
Vittore	veet-TO-re	Italian
Mahendra	-	Indian, Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Sanskrit
Carlos	KAHR-los (Spanish)	Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan
Joel	JOL (English), JO-əl (English), ho-EL (Spanish), zhoo-EL (Portuguese), YO-el (Swedish, Finnish)	English, Spanish, Portuguese, Swedish, Finnish, Biblical
Bree	BREE	Irish