In my classroom is a quote board and I don't care how cliche it may be for an English teacher to have one. The first quote I post each year is by author and poet Sylvia Plath: "I took a deep breath and listened to the old brag of my heart: I am, I am, I am."

Not far from the quote board is a portrait of Plath. When seated at my desk poring over lesson plans and pitiful thesis statements, I glance across the room and look into her eyes. They seem to say to me, "Keep going."

While a student at Smith College, Plath once wrote herself a list of Back to School Commandments, beginning with three rules on how to behave around her new beau.

Image via OpenCulture

Inspired, I decided to pen commandments of my own for my love and my labor.

Photos by Brendon Pinola via StyleBlueprint Birmingham

1. God is Love and Love is Life. When it comes to faith, I have more questions than answers. Though I identify as Christian because I love Jesus, organized religion confuses me to no end. It always has. It probably always will. But I am sure that God is Love and Love is Life. My life should center on loving others and loving myself. I believe this is how we worship. This is why I consider my marriage a ministry and my feminism a divine calling. When I serve my husband, when I join hands with the women of my tribe to help them make their dreams come true, these are holy acts. When I share pillow talk with my husband, when my friends and I share secrets over a bottle wine (or two), this is communion.

Image via B-Metro.com

Sometimes I feel as if I’m caught in a love triangle—writing and teaching both tugging at my heart. I was born to teach, but I didn’t realize this until after working in education for seven years. When I was a girl, I named all my dolls and other toys, arranged them in nice, neat rows in alphabetical order, and then launched into a lecture on whatever struck my fancy at the time. The classroom called me early in life, but I didn’t know it.

But I was also born to write. This I’ve known since the day I wrote my first poem. I was only 7 or 8 years old, so it was terrible, and I’m sure it included the line “Roses are red, violets are blue.” But it was the beginning of a lifelong love affair with the written word. And it was this love that led me to study journalism. I had dreams of working for Essence magazine and one day starting a print magazine of my own.

But a career in education was still whispering in my ear, flirting with my future plans. In graduate school at UC Berkeley, I was a graduate student instructor, or GSI, and taught a communications class for undergraduate students. I was charged with breaking down the complicated concepts and theories the professor discussed in her lectures. I did such a good job that students assigned to other GSIs would ask to come to my class, willing to sit on the floor or stand in the back if there weren’t enough desks.

I applied for Teach for America. I was accepted by Teach for America. I turned down Teach for America. I had also been offered a job as a features reporter in a city that I loved with the man whom I love. Writing won my heart again...

Read the entire article at B-Metro.com.