Anam Cara: The journey inward as told through image and function

Generally I believe everybody is at least three people, the person the world sees, the person our loved ones see, and our true self. Sometimes  I think we tend to close ourselves off from the outside world, work very hard to decorate our outer selves, and hope that that's all people will see us for and yet hate it when they do. To me it's the deepest conflict of self, this desire to have the world embrace who we truly are, yet afraid of the vulnerabilty this position puts us in. The thistles, griffons, hounds, and interlace knots are worked on the outside of the vessel. Griffons and hounds are mythologically tied to protection and gaurdianship, thistles are thorny hardiness surrounding a beautiful bloom. All of this is meant to communicate the complexity of the armour we build around our true self. On the top of the vessel is my "Luck and Love" knot, that's been pierced to allow light to shine through because often it seems it is only with a little luck that we allow that light of love to be cast through our defenses..

.The doors open and we can begin to see the beauty of the stone that lies within. We make ourselves a little more vulnerable to the world, but still remain relatively comfortable within our protective shell. You can see the "Luck and Love" knot casting itself upon the stone, I like to think this is akin to the idea that the love we feel from the outside is actually just a reflection of the love that resides within us, merely a shadow dance pointing to the true source. 

The pendant itself is us when we love one another. We always keep a little hidden, but for the most part leave ourselves exposed. The clasp on the stone's cradle is worked with my "Two Hearts Joined" knot, when we surrender oursleves completely to another, the line between "I" and the other blurs, I believe this is the door to the soul, what can be called our Buddha nature, or that space before a thought arrises.

The full beauty of the stone is only revealed when all of the exterior housing is abandoned. Although man has shaped it, it existed before our conception of it... natural, raw, and filled with the light that sparks every atom in the universe, beyond our comprehension but imbued in every aspect of us. Anam Cara means spiritual friend. A true spiritual friend will guide us past all the beauty and distraction of our many layers to the truth that resides within.