The Restless Line Volume 1

Restless Excellence | The Restless Line (Vol. 1)
Answering the questions we don’t always say out loud

This episode introduces The Restless Line: a new series within the Restless Excellence podcast where we explore the questions that sit beneath the surface of leadership, growth, and identity.

Questions that don’t always get said out loud in meetings, that follow you after the conversation ends, and even the ones that make you pause when everything looks “fine” on paper.

In this first volume, host Tonya Richards, HR executive, organizational strategist, and creator of Restless Excellence responds to real questions from leaders and professionals navigating the tension between performance and authenticity.

This episode explores:
 • Speaking up without overthinking
 • The quiet pressure of feeling “behind” despite success
 • Setting boundaries without damaging relationships
 • Navigating the in-between space of outgrowing your role
 • Showing up confidently in rooms where you feel less experienced

What emerges is a deeper truth: The questions we carry are rarely just ours and how we answer them shapes how we lead, grow, and show up.

This is not about having perfect answers but about building the awareness to ask better questions and the clarity to move forward anyway.

© 2025 Tonya Richards. All rights reserved.

Restless Excellence™ is a trademark pending.

All original content produced are the intellectual property of Tonya Richards and may not be reproduced or presented as original work without prior written permission.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

This is Restless Excellence, a podcast for people who care deeply, work hard, and are quietly asking themselves, is this sustainable? I'm Tanya Richards. I created this space because I've lived the tension between achievement and exhaustion. The tension between being capable and being depleted. The tension between success on paper and something feeling off in my body. Restlex excellence isn't about doing more. The truth about work, the truth about leadership, the truth about ambition, and ultimately the cost of carrying too much for too long. These conversations that we'll explore in this podcast, they aren't going to be polished. They'll be reflective and they'll be honest. And they're for people who don't want to lose themselves while building something that matters. Let's get into it. Today's episode is a little different. This is actually the first edition of what I've called the restless line. Cute, right? I thought so. It's actually a space where I answer real questions. The kind of questions that you sit with, the ones that don't always get said out loud in meetings, nor get said out loud in leadership spaces, or even in conversations with people you actually trust. This space, the restless line, is an evolution of restless excellence, where I'll be answering questions that have come up along this journey from listeners and or readers of the newsletter. If this is your first time listening, I'll take a moment to introduce myself. I'm Tanya Richards, HR leader, organizational strategist, and someone who've spent over 20 years helping leaders navigate the exact challenges you're all asking about. The truth is, the questions that you may be thinking of and you think that it's just yours usually isn't. So if something in this episode, the restless line, volume one, resonates, I want you to take it personally and do that in the best way. Let's get into it. The first question that I received and that I'll respond to, it seems to touch on confidence versus overthinking. The question was, Tanya, I struggle with speaking up in meetings. I always feel like I need to have the perfect thing to say, so I end up saying nothing. That's actually a common one. Now, what I would say to that is you're not alone. What you're describing isn't a lack of confidence, it's actually a habit of just overfiltering. Somewhere along the way, you may have learned that your contribution needed to be fully formed or fully polished, maybe even fully right before it was worth saying. And that's a standard that most people in the room are not actually holding themselves, to be quite frank. The shift is this that you need to employ. Your value is not in perfection, it's actually in perspective. You don't need to deliver a conclusion every time you speak. Sometimes the most valuable thing you can offer is a question. Ask questions, be curious. You can even offer an observation or maybe even a different angle. So try this. Instead of asking yourself, is this good enough to say? You should ask yourself, does this move the conversation that we're having forward? And when you do that, that's actually a completely different framing. And it's much more useful than what you may be used to. The second question that I'll go to seems to be around feeling behind despite success. So the question was, Tanya, you need to help me with this. On paper, I'm doing well in my career, but I constantly feel like I'm behind. I don't know compared to who, but the feeling is still always there for me. Now, what I would say to this particular question is that it's one of those quiet tensions that a lot of us high performers actually carry. What you're doing is that you're describing in actuality what your progress is. It's actually about your reference point, if I will. Now, when your internal measure of success is not clear, or your mind will default to try to compare you to others. And when you do that, that's not helpful, it's actually unstable. It constantly shifts depending on who you're looking at at any given point in your career or um wherever you are at that point. Now, the real question is: have you as an individual defined what's on track? What does that mean to you? Not culturally, not even professionally, but what does it mean to you personally? If you haven't, you will always feel slightly off, even when you're doing objectively well, meaning by other people's standards from an external point of view. The work here that needs to be done is to really get clear on your own markers, not someone else's. Understand what matters for you and what doesn't. And ultimately think about what you're working towards or what you're building towards. Because once you have that clarity, then all the rest of it just becomes noise. And the noise gets reduced once you get clear. Question number three. Question number three seems to be about boundaries without damaging relationships. Ooh. The question is, how do I set boundaries at work without coming across as difficult or uncooperative? Hmm. This is a big one. Especially for people who are known for being reliable. Oh my goodness, I have so many stories. Now, what I guess I'll offer is that most of the fair around boundaries is really not about the boundary itself. It's about the story that we attach to it. That story that we've made up in our head, actually. We think setting a boundary will change how people see us. That will go from looking helpful to be experienced as difficult overnight. The reality is clear boundaries actually help to build trust, especially when they're communicated well and effectively. The key, though, is how you position them. Instead of saying no in a way that feels abrupt or not really nice, you have to anchor that no in clarity. So say things like, here's what I'm currently focused on, or here's what I can realistically take on. Maybe even here's what would need to shift for me so that I can do this well for you. And ultimately, when you approach it that way and you say it in those terms or in those words, that's not actually resistance. It's just being responsible. And the people who actually value your work will respect that. Now, what you might be noticing is that these questions may sound a little bit different, but underneath, they're really all about the same thing. It's about how do we see ourselves and how that shapes how we actually show up in the workplace. Let me go to another question, and I think I'll do about five for this particular episode. So this is actually the fourth one, and it seems to focus on outgrowing your role. The question here is, Tanya, I feel like I've outgrown my role, but I don't know what's next. How do you navigate that in-between space? Now, what I would say is that in-between space is uncomfortable, and it's actually uncomfortable for a reason. It doesn't usually offer clear identity or any direction, but it's very, very, very important because what's actually happening is not just transition, it's sort of a recalibration that is necessary. You as an individual, you're starting to recognize that what once challenged you no longer does. And that's information and data that you should be using to determine what those next steps are. I think the mistake that most people make is rushing to fill that gap with the next title or the next opportunity, and doing so without fully understanding what they actually want to grow into. So, what I'll say to you is instead of asking what's next, you should be asking, what am I ready for that I wasn't ready for before? And that's a question that actually tends to be more honest, and it's one that is more useful for you in making that decision and determining what that next move is. Question number five seems to be about confidence in high-stakes rooms. Ooh. Interesting. The question was how do you stay confident when you're in a room where you feel like the least experienced person in the room? What I would say is first, let's reframe something because it just needs to be reframed. It's a mindset shift that needs to happen at this point. Being the least experienced in the room does not mean being the least valuable. Experience is one form of contribution, it's not the only one, though. You can bring perspective, you can bring a different lens. You can also bring questions that other people might not have even thought of because they may be too close to whatever that problem is that they're trying to solve. Confidence in those types of rooms doesn't come from matching everyone else's, by no means. It comes from understanding what you uniquely add. And once you determine what you're adding, anchor yourself there. You don't need to take up more space. For some reason, some people think that that's necessary. It's not. You just need to take up your space and ensure that whatever that is, that you do so fully. So, what I hope everyone takes away from this particular episode, the restless line, our first volume of this, is the questions you're asking yourself right now, they actually matter. They matter the way you're answering them. You don't need to have everything figured out to move forward. You just need to be willing to be honest about where you are at any particular given point in time. If one of these questions that I answered earlier stayed with you, sit with it a little longer. There's something there for you to really process and continue with me on this restless excellence journey. This is Restless Excellence.