Mirror, Mirror on the wall whose the most Magical of them all? A guide to Mirror Magic

“Mirror, mirror on the wall…..” A  famous Phrase many  know but, did you know that you can use  mirrors for more than just seeing your own reflection, putting on makeup and asking them “who’s the fairest of them all” ?  Mirrors can be used in many different kinds of magical ways in your practice and in your life. The connection between mirrors, your identity, reality, your self, and your self-image are strongly tied together.

Of all the spiritual methods of inner work available to us in the 21st century, mirror work is one of the simplest and most powerful.

Unlike many pathways to inner growth out there, you don’t have to go out and splurge large amounts of money or time.

Thankfully, mirror work is a practice that is freely available to anyone – all you need is a mirror! And nearly all of us already have access to one.

If you’re looking for a simple, practical, and deeply transformative practice that can become a daily habit of self-love, look no further than your bathroom mirror.

Read this blog post to learn all about how you can become the most magical of them all with the many uses of mirrors. 

My love for mirrors

I Personally deeply love mirrors especially as a grey witch and mystic who thrives in the liminal space and duality. Mirrors have this very mesmerizing way of pulling you into a portal of your own reflection and into a new reality. Which really is what is happening when you look into a mirror from a scientific perspective. Every time we look into a mirror it’s our perspective of reality that is being reflected back to us. 

When you think about this from a spiritual and magical perspective it’s both terrifying and exhilarating. To know what you are seeing and in a mirror is both real and unreal at the same time. It opens up this mindset that allows you to dive head first into the portal of reflection for some of the deepest shadow work you can experience and journey to fully understanding your identity and soul contracts. 

This deep pool of reflection a mirror opens you up to also has this amplifying effect to your magic and the messages you receive through many forms of divination as well.

Magic mirrors as a tool

Mirrors are both simple and complicated tools of magic. Through ages, they have been used for scrying, searching for the truth, finding your personal unknown – and as portals. 

They have also been  used in protection spells to reflect unwanted energy back to its sender, or keep entities out of your home or sacred space as well. They can be used as an amplifier to your magical workings as well. There is also the concept of the black mirror we will dive into as well. 

A mirror can be such a handy tool to use because they are relatively easy to get your hands on. You can use your bathroom mirror, a full length mirror, a compact mirror really anyone  you choose to use. Keep in mind depending on the use and workings you are doing with it you may need to make sure you have cleansed and charged the mirror prior.  I also find I have much clearer results when I am using one of my own mirrors instead of someone else’s or one outside of my home, though you can do that if you need to.

Is a Mirror “evil”?

The quick answer, like any other type of magic yes/ and no. 

Can it be used for malicious intent? Sure, it can. But, any magic and practice can be. Just like mirror magic can be used for really useful, helpful and beneficial intent as well. It all is up to the practitioner ; how they are using it, and their intent each time they use it.  It also depends on your view on good and evil. For a practitioner like myself who doesn’t believe in that viewpoint the answer is of course no; always. To read more about my viewpoint you check out a previous post here.  https://modgepodgemystic.com/how-i-found-my-magical-spiritual-path/ and here https://modgepodgemystic.com/who-am-i-as-a-witch-and-what-is-my-path/

But, many do not see it as I do, so let’s talk about the negative superstitions and ideas that surround mirrors in both the magical/ pagan community and in society as a whole.

 Mirror magic can actually be a pretty controversial topic and practice when you bring it up. Usually, when I do  I am hit with so many reasons for why I should not be using it and I see witches all the time on social media asking if it is okay to even have mirrors in their homes, near their altars or near their beds. I even see other witches scaring them completely away from them with many different superstitions and beliefs.  

Now, everyone can have their own belief and superstitions from their cultures and I respect that but, we also need to be willing to look at other viewpoints and beliefs as well and understand not everyone will believe any or all of the common superstitions and beliefs I will list below and being willing to do this is how we truly stop gate keeping. 

List of negative beliefs and superstitions about mirrors;

Honestly the list could go on. Some of these beliefs have cultural aspects behind them like with the one concerning the fae. Others are just scare tactics in my opinion from one specific church *cough, cough * Christianity to keep us away from a true tool to amplify our power and remind us that we are divine beings ourselves and not just God and Jesus. 

Mirror work; what is it?

Mirror Work was a method originally developed by inspirational teacher Louise Hay as a way of getting in touch with the inner self. The primary purpose of mirror work is to develop self-love, self-care, and a more meaningful relationship with others.

By simply looking into the mirror for a certain amount of time each day and gently talking to yourself, you can foster a more compassionate and forgiving connection with yourself.

Mirror work can make us feel initially uneasy because it exposes our inner critic in plain daylight.

Suddenly everything we feel about ourselves that we might not be aware of comes to the surface. And if you haven’t developed a compassionate relationship with yourself, you might be prone to believing all the nastiness whispered in your ear by your inner critic.

Of all the spiritual methods of inner work available to us in the 21st century, mirror work is one of the simplest and most powerful.

Unlike many pathways to inner growth out there, you don’t have to go out and splurge large amounts of money or time.

Thankfully, mirror work is a practice that is freely available to anyone – all you need is a mirror! And nearly all of us already have access to one.

If you’re looking for a simple, practical, and deeply transformative practice that can become a daily habit of self-love, look no further than your bathroom mirror.

Spiritual Awakening & Mirror Work

As a symbol of truth and clarity, mirrors are one of the most ancient and direct ways of accessing self-realization.

Some of the earliest uses of mirrors date back to Anatolia (now called Turkey) from 6,000 to 8,000 BC. These ancient mirrors were made out of obsidian, which itself is a stone symbolic of psychological purification, shadow integration, and protection.

By using a mirror to consciously access the inner layers of our being, we gently remove the blocks and untie the knots preventing our ability to grow and evolve. Mirror work can facilitate a deepening of our spiritual awakening process.

Mirror work and the inner child

Mirror work is an intensely effective way of helping us to re-establish a connection with this delicate part of ourselves.

When looking into the mirror and trying to reconnect with the inner child, it’s not unusual to feel waves of sadness wash over you. You may also experience unexpected bubbles of excitement or joy. But typically, it’s common to experience heavier and more uncomfortable emotions first.

Although this kind of mirror work can be upsetting and unpleasant at times, these feelings point to deeper work that is alchemizing at a subconscious level.

Simply gazing at yourself in the mirror and comforting your inner child can be a tremendously healing practice and a powerful form of inner child work. The more emotions you experience, the more a sacred kind of purging and transformation is happening.

Mirror Work; portal to the soul

The eyes are the mirrors to the Soul as the old saying goes, and mirror work gives you direct access to this core part of your being.

However, it’s not always possible to directly connect with your deeper Self. Most people first experience a harsh inner critic that arises and serves as a doorkeeper to the deeper psyche.

To make it past that harsh doorkeeper, you must learn to disarm it through mindfulness and self-compassion. It’s at this point where inner work practices such as self-love become vital to work through your insecurities and self-resentments.

How to do Mirror work

There are no official methods of doing mirror work – although you can try the 21-day practice developed by Louise Hay in her book.

Personally, I prefer to tailor mirror work to myself and my own needs. Here are some of the fundamental principles of mirror work that you might like to keep in mind if you want to create your own practice:

Use affirmations that feel authentic to you (I’ll explain this more below)

Dedicate at least two minutes every day

Do mirror work in private so that you aren’t disturbed (or feel the need to keep your guard up)

It’s okay to feel emotional – let yourself feel whatever comes up

Keep a journal where you record any notable experiences (I’ll explain this more below)

With that being said, here’s a simple step-by-step guide to mirror work that you can use and adapt to your own needs:

1. Commit yourself

2. Think about the best time of day

3. Choose or create your own affirmation

Why use affirmations, you might wonder? Affirmations counteract the negative self-talk that runs through our heads – they also help to reprogram our minds.

4. Repeat your affirmation (with feeling)

5. Embrace any emotions that arise

6. Place a hand over your heart

7. Record your discoveries

How to use mirrors Magically in spells and rituals

There are so many ways to use them to amplify your magical workings, spells, rituals, and your life. Let me walk you through some of them now, and remember I may miss some and if I do always comment and let me know so, I can grow my knowledge and find a new way to use them.

Amplifying Magic

I mentioned above about leaving mirrors on the altar for this purpose ( we will go in depth more later too), but mirrors can be set up for any spell to significantly boost the power of individual elements! Strategically placing mirrors around whatever aspect you want amplified (candles, stones, yourself) will have the most impact and I recommend using multiples of three when deciding how many mirrors to use.

Breaking Mirrors

People have major reservations about breaking mirrors and this superstition goes back a long way. Symbolically, breaking a mirror can represent breaking some aspect of yourself or “breaking through” to an enlightenment.

For spells involving moving past old obstacles, breaking bad habits or cycles of behavior, you can look into the mirror and tell yourself what you want to change, what habits are coming to an end, then put the mirror into a cloth bag and break it (safely). These pieces can then be discarded or used in a larger self-altering ritual.  

Bridging Worlds

 Mirrors are sometimes seen as windows into other dimensions or a way to look in on others without their knowledge. This made mirrors tools of divination. It was believed that your reflection was your soul and therefore when used for scrying or divination, you could theoretically ask your soul-self questions or ask to see something happening elsewhere. Black scrying mirrors are actually less reflective so you don’t see yourself as clearly. The reason for this being that your own reflection was considered a distraction from whatever you’re actually hoping to find in the mirror’s surface. We will go over them in more detail later though.

Scrying with a  mirror; Catoptromancy

Scrying is one of the best known forms of divination, and can be done in a variety of ways. And when I say a variety I mean a variety from using raindrops, snow, ice, bread, smoke, and so many more if you want me to do a post on more ways to scrying let me know in the comments.

Catoptromancy (Greek: κάτοπτρον, katoptron, “mirror,” and μαντεία, manteia, “divination”) is a form of mirror magic. It’s technically scrying done with mirrors. Scrying is a relative of clairvoyance, augury, or divination and it refers to the practice of looking at an object to receive a message or vision. In scrying, the intention is to “see deeper”, to get visions or messages, or to gain inspiration, guidance, and revelation. You can use a black mirror or a regular mirror as well. 

A couple things on this; some think the mirror is the one proving the answers and the messages and others like myself see the mirror simply as the conduit and tool that is allowing me to receive the message in a more clear way for me to understand. 

Beauty Magic

Get your favorite color of lipstick or if you are like me and do not use it you can use chapstick as well, and a bowl of rose petals. Stand in front of your bathroom mirror, or use a handheld one, and place the lipstick in the bowl of rose petals. Say Beauty within and outside of me, beauty I feel and what others now see. Luscious color to last a while, on my spirit and on my smile. Apply the lipstick, blow yourself a kiss in the mirror, and admire how awesome you are. Keep your lipstick handy for touch-up applications as it wears off during the day. When you go to bed at night, keep the lipstick in the bowl of rose petals beside your mirror.

Protection Magic

Mirrors can be used for protection and binding spells. They send evil deeds and negative energies back to their senders. Think about it like light: when a light hits a mirror, the mirror reflects the light back. The principles of protective mirror magic are similar: the mirror acts as a shield that reflects the energy back.

Protecting from negative energy attacks

When you feel something is threatening you, your property or anything very close to you, place mirrors on every window of your home, facing out. The mirrors will reflect any negative energy sent to you, back to its sender.

Protection from lies

When you are about to go into a tough situation where you feel you might be lied to, bring a small hand mirror with you. Hold it in your hand, mirror side facing your opponent. It doesn’t matter if the person spots it – you can always say that you have it for some other purpose. If you want this magic to be even more effective, make your opponent look in the mirror.

Super simple defensive spell

Fogging up a mirror and reciting an incantation is said to reveal to you those who seek to harm you.

Repelling unwanted energies

In the bowl, facing the mirror, place something that represents your target – the person who is cursing you. This can be a photo, a business card, a small doll, an item that they own, or even their name written on a piece of paper. This will reflect that individual’s negative energy back to them.

You can also create a mirror box. It works on the same principle as a single mirror, but uses several mirrors to line the inside of a box. Just hot-glue them in place so they don’t move around. Once you’ve done so, place a magical link to the person inside the box, and then seal the box. You may use black salt if you wish to add a little more magical oomph.

One of my favorite methods of making a mirror box is to incorporate the shards of a mirror you’ve smashed with a hammer while chanting the person’s name. This can be such a big release for you mentally and energetically and than you add all that release to the spell when you use the shards in the box.

Suspended binding

One way to bind using mirrors is to place a picture of your target between two separated mirrors, usually performed in a hallway, symbolically holding the target in suspended animation.

Simple binding with mirrors

I suggest getting a tube (from a toilet paper roll, for example), securing a small poppet in the middle of this tube and then slot two mirrors on each end of the tube. Paint the tube black or wrap a black cord around it, then pop it in the freezer. If you wish, you could also place a clear quartz in with the poppet to amplify the binding.

Shattered sanity hex

So, you really want to shake someone’s balance. Well, then, load a mirror with magic. The mirror should be big enough to be broken easily, and if possible, frameless.

Get a taglock from your target, such as one string of hair, and glue it on the other side of the mirror. Or, write the exact name and birthdate of your target on the back of the mirror (you probably want to be very subtle with this).

Meet your target. Present the mirror to them and make them look at themselves by complimenting their eyes and asking them to look at a detail in their iris (such as a dot, shape, color, or the dark ring of the iris). The longer you can make them look, the better.

Arrange it so that the person turns away. Then, “accidentally” break the mirror so that the person sees it.

*This one I got from a blog quite a few years back, added it to my book of shadows and can’t find the name anymore so once I find it I will update this to add a link to them 

Mirrors and the altar

I touched on it earlier that you can have mirrors at your altar, let’s talk about the two different reasons why, defense/ protection and amplification. 

The first one I want to talk about is amplification. 

Amplify your altar

Think of it like this, when the sun hits a mirror what happens? The beam of light gets reflected back brighter as it’s absorbed into the reflective surface and then bounced back. (That part we will talk about in a minute.)

That part where the beam of light gets brighter as it’s absorbed into the surface, that’s the effect a mirror can have on your altar. I do this by having a mirror placed at the back end of my altar facing it wide open to see every part of my altar, and myself when I come to it for prayer, spell workings, or rituals.  

Defending your altar

We talked about how it can amplify your altar now let’s talk about how it can defend your altar. Do you remember when I sad we would talk about the bounce part of the sun bean hitting a mirror. 

Well that bounce back is how a mirror protects your altar. By doing just that not only does it bounce and reflect back the unwanted energies or attacks it sends it back already amplified as well. 

One tip with this though, I felt it was confusing and a little chaotic to have a mirror on my altar for each intention.  So, to fix that I started drawing protection sigils on the one for that specific intention to make it  much more clear intention. 

Black Mirror

We can’t talk about mirrors without talking about black mirrors.

A black mirror is a tool that is used for example in scrying, Goetic rituals for evocation, and searching for your personal “unknown”. Some consider it to have a bit of controversial nature, but I think it’s still pretty common magic.

A black mirror often is a plate of glass that is painted glossy-black from the other side. It can also be made from black glass completely. The main point is to look into the dark reflection. Not just a couple of minutes. But a session with black mirror gazing could take for example 20 minutes. What most of the people can expect to start seeing is how their face starts to morph.

An ideal black mirror has enough size so that if you hold it and place it arm’s length away, you can still see your face clearly. Smaller than this may not reveal enough, and larger than this pulls your focus on a wider area. But, it depends on your skills and purpose. Same as with size, goes with the shape: A round black mirror holds some traditional worth, but I wouldn’t worry about the shape too much.

Protecting your mirrors

If you choose to use your mirrors as a magical tool you’re going to want to treat it just like every other magical tool, by cleansing them, consecrating them and protecting them.  You can do this several different ways. 

Let’s talk cleansing first;

Smoke Cleansing 

Smoke cleanses a space of negative energy. You can use any incense for cleansing, but some incense that corresponds to cleansing are:

Sandalwood

Sage

Frankincense 

Lavender

Jasmine 

Choose from these options, or you can even mix up your own incense with protective herbs and resins.

Cleanse With Essential Oils

A few drops of sage essential oil or any other protective essential oil can be rubbed onto the mirror. Leave the oil on for a few minutes, and then wipe it away.

Sandalwood

Patchouli

Frankincense 

Cypress 

Rosemary

Lavender 

Myrrh 

Sage 

Pine 

Vetivert

Cinnamon

Moon Or Sun Cleansing

Putting your mirror out to be exposed to fresh air and sun or moonlight is a powerful way to cleanse it of all negative energy. Nothing can fight the power of the sun and moon, not even the most powerful spirits and demons.

You can choose to use either celestial body; it’s up to you and which energy you prefer to work with. Leave the mirror exposed to whichever light you choose for at least 4 hours.

Once it has been cleansed now here is how you can protect it from unwanted energies.

Drawing A Pentacle On It

Drawing a pentacle on your mirror is an easy way to protect it from being possessed. The pentacle will stop anything bad from going in or coming out of your mirror.

You can also create your own protection sigil or rune to draw on it as well.

Sprinkle salt water 

Salt water is boosted with both protection and purification properties which makes it a great and usually easy way to add some protection. 

Place protective crystals around it

Crystals of all kinds can be used for protection and you can add their protection to your mirrors by placing them near them in front of them is the best.

Alternative Mirror

If you can’t get past the legends, superstitions or beliefs about mirrors, water is an alternative you can use for any of these methods and magics. Water was the first reflective surface we used to see ourselves and lots of superstitions and lore cropped up about what this reflection truly meant. If the water rippled while you were looking into it, well, that was bad news because whatever happened to your mirror self would obviously happen to you (not sure why ripples were bad for you… they sound kind of fun). You could become transfixed by your reflection like Narcissus, or unwillingly invite cruel spirits through. Water, though, is a very gentle mirror and conducts energy well. Remember what I said about trapping? You can use the water’s smooth surface in the same way, and then have a more tangible ingredient for spells. Witches have used water for divination just as they have used mirrors and if you’re more comfortable using water, then it’s a perfect alternative.

Wrap up

Mirror work is deceptively simple but tremendously empowering. So much healing work can be done by simply looking at yourself in the mirror and expressing self-loving affirmations.

One of the most amazing side benefits of mirror work is how it impacts your relationships. By learning how to love yourself more, life becomes more harmonious and your connections with others blossom and flourish.

And finally, mirror work helps to facilitate and deepen our spiritual awakening, aiding us in gaining clarity and inner illumination.

Today using mirrors isn’t as common as it used to be, so experiment to find the best way to incorporate mirrors into your craft and revive this ancient and effective practice! Mirrors are a brilliant tool for many kinds of magic. They offer an interesting tool to explore the depths of your mind. Let me know what they help you uncover when you explore with them!

To expand your knowledge about this type of magic or if you’d rather listen than read; you can watch my free class with Divination Academy on YouTube below!

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