I recently tweeted:

Starting at Greenpeace basically made complete my transformation into a complete commie, hippie, left-leaning bastard.

For a long time now, I – as so many do – have been searching for something bigger. A cause, a reason to live and work, something that I could disappear into, like an amoeba. Lose shape and colour, and fold amorphously into the form of another, larger cloud.

I wouldn’t have to think or decide anymore. It would give me all the answers. Everything would become singular and crystal clear. Absolute salvation.

Over the years I’ve flirted with different causes and different ideas. If you put all my blog posts on a chart you could probably map out, with total accuracy, my conversion from vapid, pop-culture junkie and hipster party girl, to activist (not that the former has completely left me).

I love Greenpeace, and I think the work we do is so important, but working there hasn’t meant I’ve lost all body and form. Because I’ve realised I should never have searched for one cause, or one organization. What I was looking for, and what I have found, and what I can credit Greenpeace for having made my search complete, is an identity.

I am an activist. And an activist need not be restricted to one fight. An activist is an environmentalist today, and a feminist tomorrow. An activist is led by values, rather than causes. An activist is a hopeless idealist, with a brilliant vision of the world she wants to live in, and then acts every day, and with every step, in accordance to that ideal. For an activist, every act, no matter how mundane, is an act of creation.

And with that, I want to introduce you to Lane Change, a new non-profit bike advocacy group I’ve started with my mate Emily D’Ath. Our first activity is the ‘Winter B-Icicle Challenge’ in which we encourage all northern hemisphere folk to ride all throughout winter. Sign-up!