As a tragically unhip survivor of the self-indulgent '80s - that glorious decade when it was cool not to care about much more than money and big hair - I thought I'd unveil my battle scars. My point isn't to embarrass myself by revealing just how uncool I was (although that'll no doubt happen). No, I'm hoping that if you're finding yourself just left of center because you can't buy into the notion that woes about dates to upcoming proms and Friday night football games really are the end of the world, you'll see that it is possible to make it through school without losing your convictions, letting your activism get squashed, or embracing that mysterious "life" we're constantly told we should get.

When I first started high school, I tried to follow in my popular sister's trendy footsteps by showing my support for school sports and looking like everyone else, but I found myself tripping with every step. Try as I might, I couldn't get comfortable in my own skin. I wondered if I needed Ritalin as my thoughts raced from worrying about what I could do to end the slaughter of billions of animals unlucky enough to be called "food," how I could help free Nelson Mandela, and if it was possible to keep the atmosphere from becoming riddled with pollution-pocked holes. I just couldn't focus on what the majority of my classmates seemed to believe were the most pressing issues of our time: Was Bo or Luke Duke cuter, whether Duran Duran was the Beatles of our generation, and if the rumor that Ronald Reagan wore a toupee was true.

I found myself withdrawing more and more from my friends, not giving them the benefit of the doubt that they'd understand where my head was, and spent increasing amounts of time reading about different social justice issues and attending demonstrations and workshops to speak out against this and in support of that. It became harder to listen to the chatter of my schoolmates without wanting to scream. The more I learned, especially about the way we abuse farmed animals, the less I could understand how people - especially those closest to me - could go on with their lives of MTV, the mall, and dates when we were killing each other, the earth, and billions of animals. Surely I wasn't the only one who could see what was going on around us. Or was I? Did the Coke-bottle glasses I had worn since second grade give me some sort of superhero, activist-powered vision to see the destruction we wreaked?

Somehow, I made it through high school and college with my head still on straight. With diploma in hand, I knew my time had finally come to dedicate all of my energy into what I felt - and still feel - is the most important social justice issue: animal liberation. For more than ten years now, I've been fortunate enough to be a full-time advocate for animals and, over the years, I've come to understand people's reluctance to open their eyes to the cruelty we inflict on human and nonhuman animals: for if they let themselves see the abuses our taste buds force on the more than one million factory farmed animals slaughtered every single hour, they would have to become vegetarian. They wouldn't be able to let the violence continue. So, now, when I find myself getting frustrated or cynical, I remind myself that I, too, once directly caused animals to suffer with every bite I took. And I let myself be hopeful that I'll be lucky enough to see the day when animal advocates are out of business and I have to find a new job.

Miyun Park is the president of Compassion Over Killing, a nonprofit animal advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C. Working to end animal abuse, COK primarily focuses on cruelty to animals in agriculture and promotes vegetarian eating as a way to build a kinder world for all of us, both human and nonhuman. If you have any questions about working with a nonprofit animal protection organization or activism in general, feel free to email Miyun at mpark@cok.net.