Have you considered it? Are you working toward it? Does your passion for it drive you, consume your thoughts and your actions?
If you asked Nicholas, all of his answers would be a resounding yes.
Nicholas has been training with Victory Martial Arts since he was 13. Martial arts was a gateway for him to develop dedication, ambition, and discipline. By the time he was fifteen, he was assisting teachers and helping his peers to train. When he was sixteen, he experienced one of the most important moments of his life.
“I remember the day that my boss couldn't come in,” he says. “He gave me the keys and told me I had to open the place up. I went in and sat in the big man chair and just thought 'This is it. This is what I want to do.'”
He decided in high school that he would go to a local college and
pursue a degree in mathematics. But this was ancillary to his true
dream: opening up his own school and imparting his passion for
martial arts to students both young and old.
Nicholas spent his final high school years balancing his AP classes with his constant training and teaching. If he was to become a great teacher, he had to become strong in both body and mind.
“I believe that life is about having a passion and a drive. I said that this is what I was going to do – every person who ever met me knew that this is what I wanted to do – and I put everything into it.”
At just 21 years old and fresh out of Stony Brook University, Nicholas saw his dream came true. He opened a new school under the Victory Martial Arts name and dived right in. Now at 26, he continues recruiting students, developing classes, and building a rapport with everyone that walks through the door.
For the younger students, classes aren't about just learning punches and kicks. He sits down with even the four year old students and asks them what they want to be when they grow up, what makes them excited, what they strive for.
“I had a kid who told me he wanted to be a dinosaur when he grows up. I couldn't tell him no! If he grows up to be a dinosaur he'll bite my head off!”
Nicholas tries to be a role model for his younger students, someone they can look up to, even talk through their problems with.
“Sometimes I feel like these kids are so underestimated. But they're amazing! I see their potential and I just want to show them how great they can be.”
For the adults in his school, Nicholas wants to create a safe place, where people who never would have crossed paths can become great friends through their shared love of martial arts. He strives to facilitate connections between his students and beams with pride when he talks about how he feels he has affected positive change in their lives.
But the constant physical exertion Nicholas puts himself through hasn't come without a price.
In 2006, right before he was supposed to complete the test for his first black belt, Nicholas noticed some pain in his knee. He struggled to ignore it but eventually had to visit the doctor. Not only was his ACL torn, the doctor couldn't even find it on the preliminary test. He tore his second ACL not long after, and has also injured a ligament in his shoulder.
The long recovery time was frustrating, but it also gave Nicholas time to think. As much as he loved martial arts, he knew he wouldn't be able to put his body through so much forever.
Luckily, a new avenue opened up for him almost by accident. Nicholas slowly learned about search engine optimization, and began implementing certain practices on his own school's website. In a few months, he no longer had to pay for Google placement and by the time the Regional Director of his school did a quick search, Nicholas' school was the number one result. Nicholas was hired to do the same for the rest of the schools in the region.
“I didn't really like the state the pages were in,” he says. “So instead I just decided to build them from scratch.” Through YouTube tutorials, manuals, and simple trial and error, Nick was building websites.
“One day I realized I was barely looking at the design page and just writing in source code. I don't even know how that happened, but it was an incredible feeling.”
His website and marketing ability has expanded beyond the school and he has decided to open his own private business instead of working freelance and relying on word of mouth.
Nicholas has begun ventures into real estate. He owns two houses and is in contract for a third. He buys in the Stony Brook area, renting out to students who want to live off campus. Just like in his school, he wants his tenants to look at his houses as a place where they can feel safe, welcomed, even part of a new family.
“I love the school – love every second of it. But I know that I want to do even more, something different. I'm just always trying to look at the bigger picture.”
Nicholas wants to keep buying and is now considering commercial real estate along with residential. At only 25 years old he owns and operates a martial arts school in, runs a website building and marketing business, and is looking to add to his real estate portfolio.
Nicholas doesn't wonder about his dream job, doesn't sit around building castles in the air. He combines his passion and ambition to forge an incredible life for himself that he is constantly looking to share with others. He inspires his students and his peers to strive for more than they have, to use what drives them to create and grow as people.
If you live in the Long Island area consider
taking a class with him at Victory Martial Arts in Setauket. There
are dozens of different classes for all age and experience levels.
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