Weathered brass key placed inside a palm-shaped ceramic dish

Original artwork, not a still

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Life's most persistent and urgent question is: What are you doing for others?

Behind the line

What it means

Our interpretation.

The speaker names one question as the one that keeps returning and presses hardest across a whole life: what are you doing for other people? Personal achievement, comfort and status are set aside as secondary. Worth is measured by service and contribution to others, and the question never expires.

Context reviewed

Share this quote