Learning Life with Jon Tota

"So the goal with peak flow is to figure out how to coach humans in multiple breathwork modalities and to become aware of how you can change your breathing and change your life moment. By moment, it's the most fundamentalist, the most elemental thing we do is to breathe." In this live episode, we have Vermont serial entrepreneur, Professor, and friend of the show Dr. Rob Williams. Whether you know...

"I guess I've always had a sense of wanting to involve everybody into the brewery from the very beginning. I was kind of well-known in the early days, when I was out on the floor working right next to everybody and if anyone asked, "why are we doing this?" they learned to maybe not ask those kinds of questions because they'd get about a half hour a conversation with me explaining that particular i...

This week we have special guests David Bradbury and Sam Roach-Gerber, fellow podcast hosts and President/Vice-President of VCET, the Vermont Center for Emerging Technologies. VCET offers programs, capital, and business mentoring for Vermont entrepreneurs. Through VCET, David and Sam co-host the Start Here podcast, showcasing business success stories across the state and the Vermont Startup Collect...

Based in Burlington Vermont, Ben Krueger is the founder and CEO of Cashflow Podcasting, where he helps industry advocates reach more people, change more lives and move entire industries forward. Having collaborated on hundreds of podcasts since 2012, he has developed 8 Podcast Principles that when applied, lead to highly effective business podcasts. Built on these principles, they've developed a p...

This week we rewind to congratulate good friend of the show, James Lawrence, on completing a journey he started 100 days ago - The Conquer 100.  That’s a full distance triathlon every day since March 1st… Yes, we’re talking a 2.4 mile swim, 112 miles on the bike followed by a marathon.  Every day.  For 100 days.  Congratulations to you, James! Back in September, James joined Jon on the podcast to...

"For Localvore, we're a technology company that focuses on really connecting local consumers and regional consumers to businesses that are creating a more sustainable agricultural economy sourcing locally and making an impact." Dan White knows what it means to go local. He likes to think of Localvore as the "Patagonia of tech," dedicated to sustainable practice and reinvestment in community. What...

"I'm very bullish on Vermont, in general, because I think the quality of life here is absolutely incredible. And I think as people start to prioritize that, and, you know, keep their business and their personal life and kind of hold it to the same high expectations, I think we'll see a lot more people moving here and a lot more interesting things happening." Jackson Latka is a Vermont entrepreneur...

"We definitely leverage Burlington and our values here in order to build a national brand. " Michael Ly has been a Vermonter for 10 years, and an entrepreneur his whole life.  Ly is the CEO of Reconciled, the cloud-based virtual bookkeeping and CFO advisory service. He has previously worked as a controller, consultant, and CFO. On top of all that, he's the co-founder of Humnly on-demand HR.  Liste...

Russ Scully’s wife Roxanne might say that her husband’s favorite word is “Yes.” After all, he’s always looking for the next great story. Growing up in New Jersey, Russ knew a typical metropolitan area wasn’t for him. So after years of living and surfing in California, he and Roxanne settled in Vermont. Once here, the Scully’s started to realize just how much can happen in the Green Mountain State....

What do you get when you combine innovation strategy, creative facilitation, human-centered design, and improv comedy? A modern creative consultancy that helps to transform organizations guided by an inventive and ardent leader.  Coonoor Behal is the founder and CEO of Mindhatch, where they help companies create the conditions for innovation and for employees to thrive. By utilizing a unique combi...

Harnessing FOMO and his love of live events, Evan Samet founded Ticket Insider - a secondary ticket reselling platform established in 2013. Juggling the rigors of undergraduate academia with growing and maintaining a business can be difficult, but Samet is here to tell you it's worth it!  "The best time to found a business is in college. You don't need to worry about how you are going to make a do...

Julia Pimsleur went big. After building her multimillion-dollar language learning business Little Pim, she set a goal to help 1 million women reach $1 million in revenues. Now she wants to help you get out of your own way and go big now! Learn the number 1 mindset technique needed to bust your limiting beliefs and achieve your biggest goals. Her new book, Go Big Now, launched last week. Check it o...

Humans aren't designed for prolonged periods of stress. Our bodies have manifest this stress into various ailments and discomforts.  Nicole Mixdorf is the founder and chief wellness office of Balance by Nature, an award-winning corporate health and wellness consulting firm. Previously a high-level executive, Nicole experienced first-hand the challenges of balancing a professional career with perso...

The most successful people in America didn't necessarily go to the best school, but they certainly worked the hardest and gave everything to be where they are. These are the entrepreneurs.  Lewis Schiff helps entrepreneurs go from moonshot takers to moneymakers. He's developed several programs, workshops, and workbooks to guide entrepreneurs to true wealth and long-term success. He shares his advi...

"I just want to be involved with promoting education, good quality content, making it fun, but making it stick and making kids enjoy it and really kind of stoking the fire of curiosity." Rene Gadelha is the Chancellor of VictoryXR Academy, providing fully immersive virtual reality education. XR is a combination of both Virtual and Augmented reality, making a fully encompassing experience for learn...

Build healthy habits and create positive changes in your life.  Andrew Kap is the founder and CEO of Awesome Marvelous, Inc., a content publishing and marketing agency, and the best-selling author of The Last Law of Attraction Book You'll Ever Need To Read. With all of his strategies and techniques, Kap helps people separate themselves and stand out through all the noise. His book offers over 18+...

With 500+ keynotes in 33+ countries, two best-selling books, and 4 world records, Ryan Avery is THE keynote speaker. He's an expert on communication skills and shows leader and their teams how to accelerate their achievement, maximize their potential, and, as his trademark teaching states, go from A to THE in their industry.  In this episode, Ryan talks with Jon about making your perfect day a rea...

Have you grown out of your job? Angela Yeh specializes in strategic career placements and evolutions, both for companies filling a role and for individuals looking to change their career trajectory.  Angela is on both sides of the fence in the creative industry, helping companies understand how to identify and attract the right talent to grow their business and culture, but also coaching individua...

Howard Shore is a serial entrepreneur who bought and sold his first company by the age of 21. After selling his first business and attending college, Shore went on to work his way up in a few prominent fortune 500 companies. He tired of the corporate scene and decided to return to his entrepreneurial roots. Shore has mentored executives and entrepreneurs of all sizes personally and professionally....

Chris Yonker is a recovering high achiever. After years in sales for 3M, Yonker was left unfulfilled. There had to be more to life than a job. Now he and his team work with high achievers like executives, entrepreneurs, and athletes to expand their consciousness and capacity for fulfillment. Chris Yonker is a vision alchemist, NLP practitioner, author of Soul Intention, and speaker.  Learn more ab...

Prospects falling through the cracks? Losing fantastic employees and talent? You need to expand your leadership team. But how? This is Mike Goldman's specialty - expanding and developing your leadership team so that your organization can grow and scale to the next level.  Mike Goldman has been a leadership team coach and consultant for over 30 years. He's helped dozens of businesses of all sizes s...

We are living in a time of extreme disruption, there's no denying it.  In this episode, we hear from a woman who has centered her life around extremes: Ebony Smith.  She specializes in training and coaching in Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, and Ambiguous (V.U.C.A.) work environments. Previously, Smith achieved a Masters in operational safety, worked for BP and Sunoco, before pivoting her career to...

Scott Miller is Franklin Covey's executive vice president of thought leadership and the best-selling author of "Management Mess to Leadership Success," which is the first book in the multi-volume Mess to Success series. He's also the co-author of another recent bestseller: Everyone Deserves a Great Manager. Scott is the host of the highest subscribed-to weekly leadership podcast show on the air ri...

Anthony Vaughan is the host of the popular E1B2 podcast show, a strategic advisor to multiple companies, and he recently launched the E1B2 Collective, where his team is focused on helping startups, improve their employee experience and put their people first by launching people operations divisions. Vaughan joins Jon Tota to discuss the post-COVID working world, the focus on a return to work, a ne...

Neal Taparia might have saved you in high school or college when you needed to quickly format the citations on your term paper. While in high school in 2001, Neal Taparia and his friend created EasyBib to make citing their sources well... easier. After gaining popularity, Taparia and his partner sold EasyBib to Chegg (another lifesaver) and stayed on to help Chegg scale their business operations a...