Last week, two cylinders in my odometer turned over. In many ways it’s just one more day, but there is something about moving to a new decade that forces reflection.

I am now older than my grandparents were when I was born, older than most of the parents of our students, and middle-age is well in the rear-view mirror.

This doesn’t seem possible. Years ago, I remember my parents saying that they didn’t feel older, and now I get it. It isn’t about physically feeling the same, but I still feel like the kid who just showed up for college in 1981.

I have been surrounded by undergraduates ever since, which may be a contributing factor. My college advisor once told me that because he spent his days with 20-year-olds, as long as he didn’t look in the mirror, he often forgot that he wasn’t one of them. That is a gift of this work: being surrounded by ebullient and passionate young people. They are inspiring and energizing — most of the time.

In truth, my feelings of still being that newly arrived college student are not a temporal Stockholm syndrome. Almost every day, I feel like the kid who got invited to the grown-ups’ table at Thanksgiving because there was an extra chair.

Instead of Stockholm, it’s a form of imposter’s syndrome. I was still in my 30s when I first became a cabinet member at a college. There were benefits from feeling that I had to prove I belonged there, but 20+ years later, that feeling has never gone away.

Occasionally, I share this perspective with colleagues and students. They are generally surprised — I’ve been fortunate to be at the grown-ups’ table for a long time, but I still often feel like an interloper — they almost always express relief. It turns out, I am not alone in these feelings.

I am comfortable in my daily work — There are many routines in calendar-driven university life, and I am blessed to be surrounded by kind and wonderful colleagues, students, alumni, and friends — but I have a perennial wonderment that somehow, I snuck into this great life.

Many of our students feel like imposters, just by being on campus. Normalizing those feelings is important. They are here because we know they belong, and each brings gifts to our community.

Making the most of their educational opportunities can exacerbate self-doubt. Progress and development are dependent upon taking risks and challenging ourselves, and that can be unsettling. Striving feels like stretching beyond ourselves. Growing is an act of becoming; we can feel like imposters because we are never there yet.

The lesson I am continuing to learn is that in some ways, we never really feel grown up, and that is a good thing.