Seven meditation myths, and what is actually true

1. “You have to empty your mind”

This is the most common reason people give up. The NHS is clear: a completely blank mind is not the goal of meditation. Your mind will wander, and that is a natural part of practice. You notice it and come back to the breath. Mindfulness is not about making thoughts go away, but about seeing them as mental events that come and go. More in meditation for beginners.

2. “You need to meditate for a long time”

There is no fixed rule. Harvard Health suggests starting with just five minutes a day and building up gradually to 10 or 20 minutes. NHS Every Mind Matters suggests 20 minutes as a good guide once you are used to it. A short practice you actually do beats a long one you keep putting off.

3. “You have to sit cross-legged on the floor”

You can meditate on the floor, on a chair or on a bed. What matters is being comfortable and able to stay upright. Harvard Health adds that a chair with good support is fine, and that you can also meditate lying down, standing or walking. See walking meditation.

4. “Meditation is a religious practice”

Many meditation techniques come from Eastern religious traditions, and meditation was historically a religious practice. But, as Cleveland Clinic notes, you do not have to be religious to meditate. NHS Every Mind Matters puts it simply: meditation is not mystical.

5. “It is always relaxing and completely safe”

Meditation is usually low risk, but not risk-free:

• A 2020 review of 83 studies with 6,703 people found that about 8% had a negative effect, most often anxiety or low mood. That is similar to the rate seen with psychological therapies.
• Negative effects also happened in people with no previous mental health problems.
• In a study of 96 people on eight-week mindfulness courses, 83% reported at least one side effect of meditation, and 37% one that got in the way of daily life for a while. For 6 to 14%, the bad effects lasted.

The NHS notes that mindfulness is not right for everyone. If meditation makes you feel worse, shorten it, change the practice or stop, and talk to someone you trust or a professional.

6. “Meditation is proven to help with everything”

A large 2014 review of 47 randomised trials with 3,515 people sorted the evidence by strength. Mindfulness programmes had moderate evidence of a small to moderate improvement in anxiety, depression and pain. For most other outcomes, the evidence was weak or missing. And meditation was not better than other active treatments, such as medicine, exercise or other therapies.

7. “Meditation rebuilds your brain”

You may have seen headlines that meditation grows grey matter. They mostly trace back to small studies, such as a 2011 study of 16 people on a mindfulness course compared with 17 on a waiting list. Its authors themselves called for replication. When researchers ran a much larger randomised study in 2022, with 218 people, they found no changes in brain structure after an eight-week mindfulness course, compared with either a waiting list or an active comparison. As NCCIH notes, brain findings are hard to interpret.

The good news: you do not need to rebuild your brain for meditation to be worth doing. A few calmer minutes a day is a reason in itself.