The Hickory Academy Leadership Podcast

Joshua Page
  • 5.0 (19)
  • SELF-IMPROVEMENT
  • UPDATED MONTHLY

Get up, get out, and get moving! With weekly motivational and family friendly podcast, and daily encouragement to help you become a blackbelt in life! Hosted by Joshua Page, founder and head instructor of the Hickory Academy of Martial Arts for the past 20 years! Stay connected with us on Instagram: @hickoryacademy

  1. APR 1

    You Owe You!

    What does the world owe you, nothing. What should you expect from others, nothing? If you are waiting for the world or other people to come and make your dreams come true, reach your goals, or make your life amazing…..odds are you will be waiting for a long time.  AND that's the good news! You don't have to wait on anybody, depend on anyone else's time line, get permission to start….you can begin right now.  You can start working towards the life you want right now, and you absolutely shouldn't waste time because you owe you.  You owe it to your present self to raise the bar, to do difficult things, to prioritize yourself, to invest in yourself…...you definitely owe it to the you of the future.  To me, one of the biggest parts of being a leader, and by now, if you have been listening you know everyone is a leader, is raising the bar for yourself. Holding yourself accountable to a high standard, to strive to improve yourself daily.  That will speak volumes, and influence the people you are leading far more than a well crafted meeting, speech, or memo.  People naturally want to follow people who endeavor to be great in something. You can’t fake discipline, consistency, and hard work. The results that come from it are unmistakable.  SO, you owe you….and you also owe the people you are leading.  Good leaders are good followers. Can you follow a workout routine, can you make it to the Dojo, are you reading every day, are you consistently showing up and giving your best at work. Easy to Say, difficult to implement sometimes. If you need some help with this, grab a pen and paper and write these next few ideas down. Schedule a meeting with yourself. Take a moment to sit down with yourself, somewhere quiet, preferably early and outside, with no distractions (your brain works better that way). List out the things you are currently doing daily, your habits, your tasks. Now write down your goals, where you want to be in 6 months, 12 months, and 5 years. Do your habits line up with your goals?  If not, it's time for step two, write out a contract with your future selves at 6 months, 12 months, and 5 years. Agree to terms with them on what you need to do to become the ideal versions of yourself when you reach those times. If you want to run a marathon in 6 months, you better start running several times a week. If you want to be at work early, you better agree on a suitable bed time. You get the picture, settle on terms, write out the action steps and sign….make sure to sign for you both, you know and you in the future.  Your whole life does not need to change, you do not have to dedicate every waking moment to your goals. Make sure to schedule time for things that fill your cup, inspire you, ground you, and bring you joy. At least once a week, make time free of distractions to get out and enjoy life, enjoy family, and friends. What's the point of working so hard, if you don’t take time to enjoy life.  Revisit your plan, “you don’t get what you expect, you get what you inspect” -Ziglar (maybe) Weekly, take time to read back over your goals, recommit, and refocus on your progress and dial in what you need to do this week to be successful, victories are the result of small wins.  Write thank you notes. It might sound odd but, let me leave you with this today. “Sincere Gratitude is one of the most important qualities of a leader. Leaders often time get all the credit, are the face of a business, or a team….but success is always accomplished through the work of the entire team. Take a few moments to recognize your team, your circle, the people who support your work. It will go a long way in building your team, and hopefully it reminds you to be grateful in a world that owes you nothing…..but surrounds you with amazing people that you owe your world to.  Get up, get out, get moving.

    9 min

  2. FEB 18

    Where Focus Goes......

    Where Focus Goes, Energy Flows -Robins "We can choose to focus on the problem, or the solution.  We can focus on what we don’t have, or on the abundance in our lives.  We can look back on what happened, at the expense of what's happening.  Once I heard someone say, if you take all your problems and put them in a pile with everyone elses…..you would jump in that pile to get your problems back.  We can all have “the grass looks greener on the other side of the fence” moments in our lives….especially with social media.  We’ve become accustomed to seeing the highlights of people's day, or their entire lives online, but not the struggles, or what it took to get there, or what life is like the rest of the day for those people. " “Comparison really is the thief of joy.”

    7 min

  3. FEB 5

    Rich Right Now.....

    Quick episode about true wealth, and your access to it right now! I hope it adds value to your day, and you share it with someone you care about! -Sensei

    5 min

  4. JAN 26

    About Last Year....Tips for a Successful 2026

    "What happened last year…happened last year. The mistakes you made have already been made, their effects might still be felt, there might still be work to be done to repair them….but the act has already happened and is no longer under our control. Let the act go, stop clinging to what could have, or should have happened. Focus on the solution, on what happens now. How do I keep that from happening again? What do I do when those conditions arise? What do I need to avoid? What do I need to add/incorporate to rise above that mistake…..because the things that you don’t fix…..stay broken. What does not get addressed, gets repeated. Life will keep sending you the same problems until you master them.  Don’t pray for no problems, work for bigger, more complicated ones. They are a good sign that you are making progress. Having the same issues over and over are an indication that you are not growing."

    6 min

  5. JAN 6

    The Road Less Traveled, and why you need to take it.

    In life there are some things that are unfortunately unavoidable, especially when you reach any level of success, make any kind of self improvement, become a better student, athlete, competitor…..the list is endless.  What are these unfortunate things, you ask…and by the way I say unfortunate because they are difficult, they will hurt you, cause you pain, but they are not bad, and as always we are going to find the good in them.  The unfortunate things we are talking about today are gossip, people saying things behind your back that they would never say to your face, and criticism/judgments from people who never even met you. “What other people think about me…..is none of my business.”  This is the toughest concept we will talk about today. What other people think about me is none of my business. We can’t control what people think, say, or do….we can’t make people see through our eyes, or be able to see through theirs.  We can of course seek to understand, to know that the person trying to drag us down has most likely been dragged down by someone else. It’s not an excuse for the behavior, but it does let us look at someone trying to harm us with compassion instead of hate. It can allow us to free ourselves from the cage of resentment that they are trapped in. How can we fly if we allow ourselves to be caged by negativity, self doubt, and pettiness. Especially when the cage door for all those things is always open if you look hard enough. You can always rise above!  Choosing the Road Less Traveled/Choosing the High Road is about rising above, making the effort to find a different, more difficult, but more rewarding path. It requires more from you, requires all your focus, will cause you to slip and fall, and it will hurt. The reward for this however is the refinement of your character, the strength you gain by forging your own path, and the company you meet along the way. Yes there are much fewer people on the high road, but they are some amazing people, they will change your life for the better, they will lift you up, push you forward, and love you because they are on the same path as you….and they have had the same rocks thrown at them from the low path as you have. Like you they choose to rise, each and every day.  The high path has the better view, it is the one the sun hits first, it’s the one the flood waters don’t reach, it's the one that illuminates the path ahead, it’s the one with the best views. You can see and be grateful for all the amazing things ahead of you, the low path is crowded and slow moving, it does not have any elevation because it only goes in slow circles at the bottom of the mountain…..the trick is you can’t tell because you are too focused on the person in front of you to look up to the heavens that are above you.  “My advice to you, to me, is don’t forget to look up. When the world tries to bring you down, when people hurt you, say things that are untrue, keep looking up, keep moving forward, onward, and upward, keep climbing, keep rising. You are meant to fly……you just need enough height, space, and courage to spread your wings.”

    8 min

  6. 12/15/2025

    Imitation is.........

    In life, in competition you will inevitably copy someone as you grow, and possibly not even consciously. I think this is a normal part of development, and as you grow you become more you……however you will see people who don’t emulate, assimilate, or ''facsimilate'' others…..they just plain steal.  You see this in China, with questionable manufacturing practices, even in politics with speeches, in writing it's called plagiarism.   In fact it even happens in the martial arts. I purposely don’t look at what other schools do in my area….one because it takes focus off what I'm doing, two because I don’t want to be influenced by it, and honestly three because I just don’t care.  My Wife brought something to my attention the other day, another school owner copied pretty much, word for word a video I did, and btw their website is mysteriously similar, they have a logo of an award we won on some of their ads….I’m sure the list goes on. This particular person actually came to my school and took notes before they opened their own school. It's not a secret, it's not hard to see that's not being influenced….its a copy (and not a great one).  She was hot, not happy, and I get it….ironically She also gave me the best advice about this type of situation years ago. She said “it doesn't matter how much they copy you….they can’t be you.”  Truer words have never been spoken, it took me 48 years to become this version of me, it took triumphs, tragedies, and a mountain of effort. It took sweat, stitches, surgery, broken bones, and late nights. It took mistakes, and shortfalls, broken relationships, and misunderstandings. It took, getting back up, trying to be better, to be more, and doing it all over again, and again to find out who I am and what impact I want to have on the world.  Becoming me is more than copying my words, its waking up at 5am, its going to the gym every week, going to yoga every week, reading and studying every week, putting on the blackbelt and not just talking about martial arts but training martial arts, getting kicked and punched, by amazing fighters I trained, to grappling with smart, strong grapplers I trained. Its being transparent about my fight and recovery with Anorexia so other people can start, continue, or win their fight with it, or any fight they find themselves in, its investing in my staff every day, giving 100 percent of me to my students when I'm on the mat whether I'm happy, sad, broken, motivated, injured, hurting, hobbling, or feeling like im in my prime.  Its impossible to be me, one because I am just simply committed or crazy enough to dedicate my life to what I do, and more so because even a perfect copy is just a shadow of who I was yesterday….and today Im better, evolving, and improving. My superpower, your superpower, our superpower is finding out, and living into who we are.  Of the astronomical and unknown number of people who have lived, or are alive now, and even who will be born long after we are gone….there will only be one you. Only one person with your set of skills, abilities, talents and blessings.  It's up to you to find out who that person is, to share that uniqueness with the world, because no one else can. We need you to be you…..almost as much as you need you to be you.

    7 min

  7. 12/08/2025

    The Power of Silence

    The answers you were looking for are in the silence you're avoiding.  We live in a world of constant noise.  Online, on screens, in stores, in airpods, glasses, everywhere you turn. In fact, now when you are getting gas for your car….you are subjected to ads!  Noise reduces discomfort, distracts us, and soothes the anxieties of life.  The question is not am I surrounded, inundated, drowning in noise….because we are. The question is how can we reduce the noise around us? How can we remove the unneeded?  How can we be quiet enough to know what our own voice sounds like?  How do we know what we really want, when we are constantly being marketed to?  How can we know what we really want if our algorithm is being curated for us?  How can we break away from the well meaning, self serving, snake oil, propagandized, agenda driven, sales driven, self bias confirming, dopamine pumping, downpour of noise?  I ask, not because I have a six step method to sell you, or asking for a friend, because I’m struggling with it just like you….and just like you I’d like to enjoy some peace of quiet….without the pain of boredom or the existential dread that comes along with it……. Except I don’t think that is part of the deal.  It’s not boredom that we are avoiding ... .its our own thoughts.  The nagging ones, the bad ones, the ones on repeat, the ones that true are false we avoid like the plague with a constant barrage of distractions.  That’s what’s standing in our way of growth, of comfortability in our own heads, and activating the massive potential we have put on pause.  How do we get from behind the screen and into full view of life right now?  1. I’m biased but martial arts is a great place to start.  We are forced to be present, in community, engaged and actively listening, learning, and thinking. We are engaged in problem solving….and not problem avoidance.  2. Being outside vs being online.You don’t have to take a picture every time you are outside….in fact you should leave your phone behind. We so rarely just walk, no noise, no phone, no agenda, just walking mindfully and enjoying the present moment. 3. Sleeping away from the phone. For me personally this is the toughest! But the light, the noise, the distraction ruins our sleep, our chance to get good rest and a chance for us to recall the day, it lessons, and the chance for gratitude.  The quote that I cannot escape, and maybe you will get some value from it too is this:  “The answers you are looking for are in the silence you are avoiding” And this one from ram dass: “the quieter you become the more you can hear.” What answers are you avoiding, what could you accomplish with a life off pause, what is hiding from you behind the noise and is waiting for you to be quiet enough to hear it?  However busy your day is, whatever is going on ....I hope you take, make, or steal a moment for silence, for reflection, or simply just to breathe. There is a power in stillness that motion cannot replicate.

    3 min

  8. 12/01/2025

    How to Get a BLACKBELT.....from Me.

    #1) Be consistent. That means training two to three classes a week. Your house does not count, coming in and assistant instructing does not count. You should be on the mat training twice a week if your intention is to get a black belt. If not….you can still get an enormous benefit of training once a week, or twice a week every other week, etc…..you just aren’t going to earn a black belt until you get serious about your attendance. Just like you can get very knowledgeable about medicine and surgery at the library and attending some classes at college…..but until you commit to medical school and graduate….you will not be a doctor.  #2) Train Hard, Train Smart. You can come in and give a halfhearted effort, you can come in and train like every fight is personal…..neither will earn you a black belt. The lukewarm person will not gain the real skills to pass, and definitely not survive the test, the overzealous person will end up hurting themselves or getting too injured to train frequently enough to test, or have the finesse required to become a black belt.  #3) Know the Curriculum.  We have had many world champions and amazing athletes at the Academy, all of them that received black belts know the curriculum and are able to teach it. You don’t have to love all of it, and in fact most gravitate to one of the big four: Fighting, Forms, Self Defense, or Pad Work…but you have to know it all and be able to demonstrate it.  #4) Be a Good Ambassador. In some fields your talent can make up for your personality, in martial arts it cannot. You have to be a good role model….not a perfect person, but a person in pursuit of perfection.  #5) Be in Shape. You do not have to be an Olympian, D1 athlete or on the cover of Muscle and Fitness….but you should be in good cardiovascular shape, be strong, and have healthy habits. That means making sacrifices outside of the Dojo for your health and fitness and should reflect a life long goal of longevity and good overall health.  #6) Be Motivated. You should come to class ready to learn and your passion for training and improving should be evident. Everyone has tough days and we are here to support your through those….but not every day. You are responsible for being passionate about growth, getting better, and being the best version of you!  #7) Be Positive. Very similar to number 6, and maybe even more important. “Where attention goes, energy flows.” especially when we are talking about having a positive or negative mindset. What to find the good in your life…start looking for it, what to find the bad…..start looking for it. Find the good in martial arts, and training hard!  #8) Be ok with walking alone. Walking with friends is always more fun, it just is. Training with friends is too. Understand however some of your training partners are going to break your heart. Everyone does not make it to black belt, and even some of the ones that do will quit. They are really quitting on themselves….but it feels like they are quitting on you and the Academy. That’s difficult to deal with, but it’s a part of high level success at anything. Sometimes we have to be ok with walking alone.  #9) Bring Someone with you. The antidote for #8! Invite people to train, encourage them to stay, invest in their success and watch your success skyrocket.  #10) Have a White Belt Attitude, with a Black belt Brain. White belts are so excited and grateful to train, they give it 100 percent and desperately want to improve…..their only hindrance is the lack of repetition and knowledge. As people increase in rank that fire can diminish. The saddest thing I see is a Green/Brown belt that has gone lukewarm, cynical, or thinks they know everything. Have a white belt mentality, upgraded with the reps and knowledge of a black belt. It truly is the best of both worlds.

    11 min
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5
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19 Ratings

About

Get up, get out, and get moving! With weekly motivational and family friendly podcast, and daily encouragement to help you become a blackbelt in life! Hosted by Joshua Page, founder and head instructor of the Hickory Academy of Martial Arts for the past 20 years! Stay connected with us on Instagram: @hickoryacademy

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