It’s time for me to finally admit the truth: My name is Nav and I am an educator.

Yes, that’s right. I’ve been openly shaping young minds each quarter since arriving at Stanford — though what I’ve shaped them into would probably be a point of some debate.

Luckily I’ve spent years practicing a patrician air and a supercilious sneer, so despite my general dislike of young people I haven’t found it too difficult to fall into the teaching profession.

Mostly those benefiting from my instruction have been passing through the heady world of physics on a journey to the somewhat sunnier (and better remunerated) climes of engineering. These folks I rarely see again. And, if I do bump into them, I hope my patrician air still counts for something.

However, back before I scored my current gig as the overlord of the Physics 40 series I spent a quarter teaching a more advanced class, aimed squarely at would be physics majors. Now these kids, well they’ve come back to haunt me.

You know that scene in Star Wars when Vader and Obi-Wan face off? Vader’s line keeps bouncing around inside my head every time I see the children around the department:

“We meet again, at last. The circle is now complete. When I met you I was but the learner. Now, I am the master.”

Of course none of the kids are truly Dark Lords of the Sith (except maybe Flip). And none of them have actually tried to strike me down (though I can see it in their eyes). Still, they are making me feel a little (more) insecure.

I always pictured graduate school as that time in my life when I would cast off the shackles that bind the student for the robes that decorate the master. I foresaw a time when I could finally feel competent; no, more than competent, I was looking forward to feeling superior.

This is the big draw of teaching. What with the constant battering at the hands of your research advisor, the struggle for supremacy amongst your compatriots and the ever-increasing sense of inadequacy, teaching is about the only opportunity you have to feel like you know more than the other people in the room, to feel that your years of education have actually given you something.

All of which means that when the little runts start to push past your boundaries of knowledge, it’s a double kick in the teeth — not only is one more shortcoming highlighted, but a source of reassurance is also taken away.

In a broader sense this is inevitable; as the expanse of what should be known opens up before you there will undoubtedly be patches that someone else gets to first. It’s galling, however, when those someone elses turn out be the very people you’ve helped on their intellectual journey.

No longer can one steel oneself to the taste of failure with the reassurance that perhaps it doesn’t matter that you don’t know something yet, for there’s always more time. Instead, you’re left desperately groping around for every wisp of knowledge from a subject that, rather than opening itself up to you, is instead drifting out of reach.

The sinking feeling that you will never command all the academic peaks you wanted to, and that those younger and newer than you will, is not necessarily a bad thing. After all, if such a thing weren’t true we would be condemned to relative ignorance until all those who came before were dead. And then who could we impress?

What’s more, the precocious undergrads I’ve been complaining about are on their way out. Seniors to a man, they’re off to graduate school in the fall; and so, even during my bitterest moments, I can still bring forth a smile by contemplating the wonderful new adventure that awaits them.

I’m bored. Entertain me at navins@stanford.edu.