Tarot Spread: The Wound and the World
A spread for Surviving with the 5 of Pentacles
The 5 of Pentacles / Coins / Disks is a challenging card to see in a reading and worse to feel as we’re moving through its energy. But there’s also a lesson in the card and a source of potential strength even for a generally “bad card.”
Pamela Colman Smith’s iconic illustration for the Rider Tarot by Arthur E. Waite shows two injured, sick, and impoverished people trudging through the snow while a faint light glows in the stained-glass of a church beside their path. The message is potent: the world is harsh, and there are plenty of resources, but not everyone has equal access to them.
When I pull this card, I often think of what in the world I’m not seeing. What are the resources that are available to me or that I could request. After all, the 5 of Pentacles leads into the 6 of Pentacles, card of the generous benefactor and supplication or of the vital flow of currency or of interdependence. For some of us, there’s an uneasy relationship to the benefactor of the 6 just as there is to the church in the 5 (and as cards of Taurus season, they’re both tied to that controversial figure of the Hierophant). What will I have to give up to get the help I need? Is the sacrifice worth it? Can I do it on my own?
This is the key question of the Survivor, an archetype that I explored this past week as I created my new Journal of Threads, a core component of my new Patreon designed to help readers incorporate simple mixed-modality practices to strengthen the soul–body connection that is the basis for a good life.
Each month of the journal witnesses the journey of archetypes as they transition from one to the next, week after week. This past week’s archetype of the Survivor was inspired by the 5 of Pentacles since it was the first decan of Taurus, and the 5 of PentaCoins is associated with Taurus I in Golden Dawn astrological tarot correspondences. All archetypes have strengths and challenges or “healthy” and “unhealthy” expressions.
This tarot spread is based on my working through those potential strengths and very real challenges of the 5 of Pentacles / Coins / Disks. It’s a card of financial and physical suffering, disruption in one’s material conditions, and worrying about what one has (Mercury caught up in Taurus), as seen in the Smith-Waite, Marseille, and Thoth traditions. But the 5 of Pentacles is also a card of stubborn independence and resilience in the face of conditions that might force someone else to give up. It’s about encountering the clash between spiritual and material worlds and finding one’s own way forward.
As with my past tarot spreads based on the minor arcana, I’ve created the layout inspired by the imagery of Smith’s illustrations, but it’s also inspired by the 5-pointed star of the Pentacle itself, a symbol of spiritual power over material conditions. Note that the shareable spread image for social media includes line art from my Life Line Tarot.
The Wound: What pain do I wear as a badge?
The Light: Where can I seek more healing when I’m ready?
The World: What should I know about how others feel that pain?
The Struggle: How does this old wound continue to affect me?
The Strength: What lessons of resilience have I learned from this?
Interpretive tip. If you’re struggling to understand the meaning of the Wound when it shows up, consider my spread for the 3 of Swords: Healing the Wound. That may help you uncover more clues or make what you aren’t letting yourself see almost impossible to ignore any longer.
Want help creating your own layouts?
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