Rohrig Study - Fives

All the fives have a clear, powerful central image, done in a large persepctive so that you can't miss the message as they sound the alarm. "LOOK," they seem to be saying, "Pay attention, how can you miss this?"

"Hey you......

B-b-b-b-b-aby you just ain't seen nothin' yet
Here's somethin'
Here's somethin'
You're never gonna forget
B-b-b-b-b-aby you just ain't seen nothin' yet."
[Bachman Turner Overdrive]

5 of Wands

Striving, pushing through rock and soil, the tendons in the arm, straining, fingers splayed, muscles burning to reach. There seems to be fire below and also flames licking along the ground up top which suggests urgency. The wands and hand are giving off steady bursts of light and energy.

A lot of energy but nothing accomplished, and even some threat of harm. Remember when you were a kid and someone would snatch something from you and hold it high and you would try and try to reach it? The stress of futility. Burning for nought.

5 of Swords

This figure is alarmed, as if he climbed thoughtlessly, but turned to find the way down looked frightening, and all the nerve ends in his body are alight with fear. It's getting dark, and he's stuck. Like a cat climbing a tree, or a child who scrambled and slid down a ravine, only to find the climb up and out too scary and slippery.

I wonder at the cross shape of the thick piece of wood at the top. Suggesting not just defeat but a larger threat of death--not just a loss of courage but of life or spirit. A change too dramatic to overcome, or a betrayal leading to a crucifixion of humility and loss.

5 of Disks

I'd be worried too if I was desperately juggling five massive, slippery balls and a meteor shower threatened to overwhelm my balance with its kiltering velocity. The rocky footing doesn't seem too stable either. One stagger would send him tripping over stones one way, and a boulder and upturned tree the other way.

Yup, this gets my chest churning with anxiety and worry just looking at it--very effective card.

5 of Cups

Right in the middle of the path! The Borg have landed on Earth, quick Yab, send the signal of friendship: 001001001.

I was meandering along, enjoying the softness of the dirt path and the meadow graases and flowers, and I saw over the mountains in the distance, that the sky was a lovely blue-green, as if melting with the meadow.

And smack dab--there was this striated rock disrupting the journey unexpectedly. Sheesh.

Striations, various layers of rock piling up over the years as if this sudden disappointment had been building forever and reached critical mass just now. Boom. Stop. Time to think about what is stopping you. Is it this rock, built up over the past years, or is it you, for not forging a new path around it?

B-b-b-b-b-aby you just ain't seen nothin' yet.

5 of Swords

Angeles Arrien has a great line about the Thoth 5 of Swords: "Yet in the background, the greater aspect of who we are, represented by the white light and the star shape, is attempting to break through fear that is created in the mind through negative thinking about the past or future."
Everything has crashed and burned, but, as Medea said after her expulsion and killing her own children, when asked what was left, "What is left? I am left!" I was struck by the cross as well, and the implication that defeat can be transcended. If, by being forced to detach ourselves from the physical by having to face it's ruin, we yet gain insight into our incorruptible spirit, then "defeat, where is thy sting?" I think the halo-ish light around this person indicates that he has attained this state of mind.

5 of Cups

This road looks as though it has been getting narrower and bumpier for some time. Then a critical point was reached. The one more thing, the straw that broke the camel's back. And suddenly, the disappointment is not with any single aspect, but with the whole. Perhaps a job has been getting steadily less fulfilling. One more aggravating assignment, and suddenly, the realization that the whole job, maybe even the whole career, is never going to lead to contentment. The disappointment felt is a huge, heavy block that looms overhead and warps the space around it. The RWS guy makes me want to say, "Hey guy, look, left over cups!" But this card seems to indicate a change in direction may be necessary, or a whole new road need to be built, in order to bypass that block before he can start enjoying the flowers and the view of the hills again.