'Inner Strength'

This photo has been straightened thanks to my friend Vinnie, THANK YOU!! (PLEASE FULL VIEW, there's allot of detail in the sculpt and paint job, I'd appreciate it ). I wanted to do something that conveyed inner srength..

The cross symbolizes spiritual strength, the wolf physical and earthly strengths, and the vines/veins symbolize struggle and complications.

I used a wolf because the animal has some personal meaning for me. I've had dreams with wolves in them my whole life (I'm 23 and I still get them). I did have a fear of werewolves and other supernatural wolves growing up, so there may be no real significance to the dreams. Wolves are my favorite animal too, I'm not going to claim the dreams have some deep meaning because honestly I don't know. This was partially inspired by the latest dream I had several months ago (including some of the visuals, like color). I painted the eyes red & yellow to capture intensity (not sure if you can tell by a photo). I struggle with intensity, it can be a bad thing socially, lol..but a good thing that drives me in allot of ways too. The wolf also stands for loyalty which is a quality I believe I have and means allot to me. Wolves are actually very loyal animals and will stay with one mate for life, they only mate twice a year but are at each other's sides all the time. The physical strength can be shown by a wolf since they are excellent survivors, superior both mentally and physically to dogs but still loyal and loving to other members of their pack.

The cross shows spiritual strength and is shining down on the earthly wolf. The wolf can manuever through the vines using agility and it's slyness but not if it can't see it's way. The spirit (cross) can shine through any density, with the help of spiritual strength the wolf can overcome any obstacle with it's soul intact even when it dies. The wolf and heart will both die and rot eventually but the soul never dies so it's important to keep intact. The heart I made to look organic so it's rough and not perfectly symetrical (not sure how to spell that, heh). A heart is also a symbol of love which can be earthly or spiritual since God's love is unconditional.. so it works both ways for this piece. Inside the heart it shows earthly and spiritual inner strength that I work to keep intact, that's pretty much what I was trying to get at here. When I'm going through hard times, these things are what have gotten me through.

Any comments I'd really appreciate, hope you like it!