17 Most Misunderstood Facts About Meditation

We all know that meditation is good for us. It can help with stress, anxiety, and depression; it can even change how our brains work. But why does it do these things? The answer to this question may not be as simple as you think.

Meditation alters your brain in three fundamental ways: it changes the physical structure of your brain; it tames runaway emotions like anger or sadness; and finally, through mindfulness meditation (a specific type), you learn how to pay attention to what’s happening now without judging or reacting right away.

However, meditation is often misunderstood. Here are 17 facts about meditation that are frequently incorrect.

1. Meditating is Just Relaxing and Doing Nothing

If you’re going to meditate, don’t expect it to be a walk in the park – it’s a full-body workout for your brain, promoting new neural connections and strengthening existing ones. This means that your brain will look different after a period of meditation compared to a person who doesn’t meditate.

2. Meditating Uses Only One Part of Your Brain

Meditation involves mindful concentration and uses both sides of the brain at once; it helps you become more receptive to sensory information and aids your focus. Another way meditation stimulates different parts of your brain is by increasing Alpha waves in regions that deal with learning and memory while decreasing activity in areas linked with stress and anxiety.

3. Meditation Requires You to Sit Still for Hours

Yes, meditation can result in a deep state of relaxation – but only if the goal is relaxation itself. For example, some people meditate daily to boost their energy levels or take a 20-minute power nap during lunchtime to feel refreshed when they return to work after eating. Meditating can also help you become calmer and focused in a shorter period.

4. Meditating Requires You to Clear Your Mind Completely

Yes, many forms of meditation teach how to clear your mind, but this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t let any thoughts pass through you during meditation. On the contrary, allowing your mind to wander during meditation is a way of allowing it to relax.

5. Meditating Will Give You Psychic Abilities

People may claim they have psychic abilities after meditating regularly. Still, it’s more likely that these people are very perceptive and intuitive as they pick up on signals around them without even realizing what’s happening.

6. Meditating Requires You to Sit or Lie Down in an Unnatural Position

Some people find that sitting is the best way to meditate because it helps them keep their back straight while also forcing them to focus on what’s happening with their body – but there’s nothing wrong with lying down if this makes you feel more comfortable. Your breathing pattern may change when you meditate, but it will become less noticeable until it becomes slower and more profound.

7. Meditating is Just a Form of Escapism

While some people might be able to get away from their problems by meditating, many others meditate to learn how to deal with these problems and become more focused so that they know how to take control of their lives once again.

8. Meditating Will Make You a More Spiritual Person

People who meditate aren’t necessarily spiritual – they have good focus and concentration and a heightened awareness of their body. Meditation is not necessarily linked with religion, either. Instead, many people prefer to view meditation as a method that helps them become more in tune with themselves.

9. Meditation is Associated with New-Ageism and Eastern Religions

Anyone can practice meditation for whatever reasons they choose – it doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with spirituality or religion. Being religious doesn’t mean you have to avoid meditation if this is something you’ve been trying to learn on your own.

10. Meditating Will Help You to Fall Asleep

Although you may use meditation as a way to help you fall asleep by focusing on the rhythm of your breathing, meditating before bedtime isn’t necessarily going to make it easier for you to drift off because it might keep you up instead.

11. If You Meditate Long Enough, You’ll Be Able To Control All Your Emotions

Although meditation is linked with positive physical and mental health, you can’t just sit down and expect to control your emotions. Meditation doesn’t change how we feel about something; it simply changes how we respond when feeling a certain way.

12. Meditation Will Clear Your Mind of All Thoughts

To meditate successfully, you must realize that this process requires you to focus on one thing at a time – whether it’s focusing on your breathing or a mantra that you repeat in your head and over again. Focusing on one item will help you clear your mind of all thoughts, which means that the only way for this to happen is if you’re able to quiet your mind long enough to focus on one focal point.

13. Meditation Will Make You More Creative

People who meditate are often described as being more creative, rather than people who don’t meditate regularly. However, there hasn’t been any research done to show whether or not meditation causes creativity or helps people become more focused to pay attention to their creative side.

14. Meditating Is A Religious Practice

Meditating is not a religious practice. You can meditate as much or as little as you want and for whatever reasons you choose (i.e., enhance your creativity, relieve stress, become more mindful, etc.) – it doesn’t have anything to do with spirituality or religion unless you make it so.

15. Meditating Is A Quick Fix

Although meditation classes can be a great way to de-stress and relieve some of the daily things that get on your nerves, it isn’t going to help you overcome any significant life problems in the process. Instead, meditation is simply a way of taking a break from everything so that when you return to your routine, you’ll be able to accomplish more without finding yourself overwhelmed by stress and anxiety.

16. Meditation Will Stop You from Acting on Your Thoughts or Urges

Since people who meditate are taught how to remain calm in all situations, they learn to control their impulses when something upsetting happens. However, meditation only teaches people how to manage their actions if they feel like acting on negative urges or thoughts; it doesn’t stop these things from happening in the first place.

17. Meditating Will Make You More Patient

Since meditating helps people focus on one thing without being distracted by anything else going on around them, they have a way of becoming more patient as a result. However, patience isn’t something that people are born with. Instead, it’s something that everyone needs to learn over time so that they don’t become overwhelmed by everything else going on around them at any given moment.

Conclusion

Meditation isn’t a quick fix to all of life’s problems. Although it can be used as a tool to relieve stress and help you relax, it won’t stop bad things from happening in the future or make you more patient from the start. Instead, meditation is simply a way for you to take a break from everything else going on around you.