Card of the month for June 2025 meets the Card of the Year...
How can embracing the energies of these cards help us make the most of June?
Here is our card to embrace during June 2025…
5 of Swords
Let’s Tarot…
Wow! Cheery, huh? 😀 Don’t PANIC!!! Read on…
So far this year, we’ve had a wonderful run of monthly cards, in February we saw the 3 of Wands; March gave us the beautiful Malika (Queen) of Cups; April raised energy levels with IV·The Emperor; and, May embraced the Taurean energy of the Page of Pentacles. Encouragingly, astrologically aligned (mostly) 😊
Unsurprisingly, Tarot being what it is, and offering 78 choices… in the words of the great Sam Cooke “a change is gonna come”… and it will arrive in June with the 5 of Swords. Titled The Lord of Defeat by the Golden Dawn and described this way in Tarot Deciphered by T Susan Chang and M M Meleen…
Fives create motion and imbalance. The Five of Swords disrupts thought patterns, the perception of "the rules."
This card’s element is Air. Intellect, communication and analysis. It is also a minor arcana card, representing day-to-day challenges, as well as opportunities. The traditional RWS1 image foregrounds an aggressor, often described as a bully prone to using excessive force, but this image focusses on the vanquished… 🧐
Deck author, Alfred Douglas, shares this about the 5 of Swords in his LWB2:
Defeat must be experienced before future success can be contemplated. Swallow pride and accept what must be.
Our cards over the last few months have encouraged us to create and reflect; all of which sat very comfortably with our card of the year (see below). This 5 of Swords reminds us, though, that sometimes things can go wrong! Look carefully at this card… it hurts, for sure!.. but it’s far from fatal, unless trying to run away from five murderous, sword-wielding blokes, of course! 😅
What can we do with this energy then? 🤔 Here are some thoughts on how we can use the 5 of Swords to help (not panic!) us during the coming month 🙂…
What recent plans haven’t come to fruition for you? Is it really as bad as it looks?
What have you learned from this hiccup? What will you do differently next time around?
Who or what will help you to feel better, right now?
Looking at those around you…
What recent alarm bells are trying to let you know that something/one has changed towards you?
Who around you might need an apology from you for something unintended (or intended!) that you have done to them?
Can you accept that your way isn’t necessarily the best way for others?
A note of caution…
The “drama” of a card titled The Lord of Defeat suggests (to me, anyway!) a large battlefield full of dead warriors, but hang on… this isn’t like that at all, is it? This guy caught an arrow with his knee… damned painful, I’m sure… but not fatal. It is very easy to overdramatise a dark-looking card like this, and truly it isn’t a happy one (and should never be sugar-coated3) but, truly, it suggests some really helpful questions to reflect on 😊 So… Don’t PANIC!!! (unless you really are being chased by five angry guys with swords! If so, feel free to panic! 😅).
So… how does this energy sit with the year card for 2025?
5 of Swords… meet IX·The Hermit
Our general card for the year is IX·The Hermit4, and on the above image of IX·The Hermit, Alfred Douglas writes…
Isolation. Quiet exploration or study. A reassessment of goals. Find your own solution, do not seek outside help.
This month’s cards are elementally poorly dignified. IX·The Hermit Earth energy, and the 5 of Swords Air energy don’t get on. Grounding, and detail focus, challenged by mental turmoil. Having said which, sometimes change and turmoil can reinvigorate tired or stuck thinking… hmmm… 🧐 but does it really have to be such a pain-in-the-knee!
Looking at these two cards together, we can see IX·The Hermit looking grumpily back towards the 5 of Swords, likely wondering what they did to find themselves in such a difficult situation, taking an important lesson from it, and… wondering where they left their earplugs to block the loud, painful screaming, too 😱.
In June, the combination of these two energies may well feel jangly, if not abrupt. For those of you who embraced the warm and peaceful spirit of last month’s Page of Pentacles, the suddenness of this month’s arrow strike (may make you question your decision to explore the archery range beyond the ‘Private Land - No Entry’ signpost) may come as a very painful surprise! 🏹
So… in June, what can we learn from working with the combined energy of these two cards…?
Numerologically, we have 5 + 9 = 14 = (1+4=) 5, which is represented in the major arcana by V·The Hierophant via XIV·Temperance reminding us that whilst there is a potentially painful learning opportunity this month, maintaining a steady and balanced perspective, throughout the more difficult moments, will help us to manage our way through it with the best possible outcome for us all 😊
Or… more simply…
Accept negative happenings with the best grace you can;
Understand that, however painful, everything offers a learning experience; and,
Stay well away from archery ranges! 🏹🏹🏹
Oh… and remember… Don’t PANIC!!! 😌
I welcome your thoughts on the above, and how this reading resonates (or not!) for you... please feel free to comment below (I am very open to respectful disagreement and discussion!) and share this free post if you feel it might interest others, thanks... 😊
Love, light, and laughter... always,
tarotbyphil 🕯️
Rider-Waite-Smith Tarot.
LWB = Little White Book, often a small, card-sized booklet included with the deck of cards, in this case a fold-out sheet with very brief card meanings included with the deck.
I wrote about the phenomenon of mis-reading dark cards with a positive spin here, check it out…
You might also enjoy last week’s post, co-authored with the brilliant
looking in more detail at a less common interpretation of IX·The Hermit energy…
phewwwww some heavy energy arriving this month! I like how it combines with the Hermit though - a strong reminder that painful experiences are not in vain and that we will come out more wise after them!
thought provoking!
I think I will look at it this way, with The Hermit being a prominent visitor to me lately.
As I reconstruct my own life from the inside out, I will guard against the temptation to absorb all the should’s and shouldn’t’s and uninvited advice and negativity coming from the outside world, the Five of Swords.
And because the Five of Swords is an air mental element, rather than an earthly one, I think those battles will all be fought in the battlefield of mental health. 🙂