Are you trying to establish a regular meditation practice but struggle to maintain it due to the challenges that arise? Or perhaps you’re new to meditation but already feel like giving up because making your mind be still feels impossible? You’ve come to the right place.
At HiVi, we strive to provide you with actionable tips to support your self-discovery journey and help you let go of everything that is holding you back. If you’re ready to let go of fear, anxiety, overthinking, and self-sabotaging, read on to learn how to make the best of your meditation practice and slowly but steadily resolve all the unhealed aspects of yourself.
Why Does Meditation Feel so Hard?
Before we get into the most common challenges most of us have faced when trying to meditate, it is important to understand why it can feel like such a struggle at first. First of all, you must know that having a hard time meditating doesn’t mean there is anything wrong with you or that you will never be able to do it. You just have to go through many layers of conscious and unconscious barriers to reach your inner stillness.
Stillness should be second nature to us, as it is our soul’s most authentic expression. However, due to the experiences that have shaped us since childhood, we must consciously work our way back to our true essence. This means going through layers of mental and emotional blockages with the help of spiritual practices such as meditation, grounding, sound healing, or others.
Besides the environment in which we grew up, which shaped the way our minds developed, the world we currently live in has a great impact on our mind’s tendency to overthink and fall into negative thought patterns. The overwhelming presence of digital gadgets in our lives can harm our minds if we don’t use them wisely. Recent scientific studies have even linked digitalization with increased feelings of anxiety and depression.
So next time you try to meditate and find that your mind can’t stay still, think about how much time you spent on technology that day and be mindful of how that time might’ve influenced your current mindstate. Our advice is to use technology only when it truly serves your greater good and not as a distraction that provides a false sense of joy but drives you further away from your true self.
Common Meditation Challenges for Beginners
If you’ve tried starting a meditation practice just to end up giving up and being disappointed because you didn’t get the results you wanted, there’s no need to worry; this is much more common for beginners than you might think. With the right guidance, some patience, and perseverance, you will soon be able to reach that inner stillness that you are craving, even when your mind feels super active.
We’ve all experienced challenges when trying to meditate, and it’s important to understand that these challenges are not signs of failure but part of the process. With patience, awareness, and gentle perseverance, every challenge becomes a doorway into deeper presence.
Here are some of the most common meditation challenges beginners face, and how to approach them with compassion and trust:
1. Quieting Your Mind
Quieting the mind is probably the most common and difficult challenge anyone faces when first starting to meditate. That is because your focus shouldn’t be on controlling the mind. After all, the more you try to control anything, the more resistance you will face, making you prone to getting frustrated and giving up your meditation altogether.
At a subconscious level, our minds are designed to be active as a survival mechanism, so they can observe any threats and come up with solutions for any possible problem. So the mind’s activity is not inherently bad, but it’s actually a protective behaviour.
The problem is when our minds constantly operate from subconscious programming instead of conscious awareness, and are consistently in a state of alertness.
In the last two decades, scientific studies have also shown that our cognitive abilities are tightly linked to emotional stimuli. In other words, what we feel has a great impact on the way our minds function, and by consciously working with our emotions, we are reprogramming our minds, too.
Taking this into consideration, it becomes obvious that what we need to focus on to quiet the mind is our inner state, and not the other way around. When we make peace inside, no matter what goes on in our minds, that creates a ripple effect that spreads throughout our entire nervous system and gradually calms the mind as well.
2. Sitting Still for a Prolonged Time
Restlessness while trying to sit still during meditation is another very common challenge. Given that most of us have active lives in which we almost always have something to do, sitting still for a prolonged time can be something unusual for our bodies. On the other hand, if your work involves a great deal of sitting, you might not really feel like sitting anymore to meditate.
But even if you’re having a hard time sitting still, even just for a few minutes, there’s no need to worry, below you will find some helpful tips to make things easier. Just be gentle with yourself and do your best, and you will surely get there eventually.
3. Feeling “Negative” Emotions
During a profound meditation practice, many unwanted emotions might surface, and that is completely normal. We have been taught that some emotions are “good” and some are “bad,” but this couldn’t be further from the truth.
There’s no such thing as bad emotions, and there’s nothing wrong with you if you don’t feel good all the time or if meditating brings up conflictual feelings. It’s actually highly beneficial to release stored-up emotions from time to time, and it is a lot healthier for them to be consciously released while meditating than for them to burst out in an uncontrolled way during a social interaction, for example.
So if you feel any “negative” emotions rising during your meditation, remember that it is completely normal. Just keep focusing on your breath, and they will eventually clear on their own; there’s no need to force anything.
4. Falling Asleep While Meditating
Falling asleep while meditating is something completely normal and happens very often, especially if you’re new to the practice. It can be a signal from your body that it needs rest, or your mind may simply not be used to the deep restorative meditative energy, and it associates it with sleeping time.
It is most important to know that even if you fall asleep, your meditation still has a positive effect on your mind and body. So don’t feel frustrated if it happens, but trust that it was exactly what you needed at the time.
5. Being Distracted by Outside Noises
Noise is part of life, and there isn’t really such a thing as perfect silence, except if you meditate deep inside a cave or something, but most of us don’t do that. So when meditating inside your house, in your garden, or any other place, there are bound to be some noises around you.
We recommend that instead of fighting sounds, you include them in your meditation. Notice them as part of the present moment and use them to anchor your attention to your senses. Birds, cars, voices, they can all become anchors to bring you back to awareness if you don’t react with resistance.
6. Not Being Able to Visualize
Some people have a vivid imagination, while others connect more through feeling, sound, or breath. If visualizing feels hard, don’t try to force it. Instead, focus on what comes most naturally to you, perhaps the rhythm of your breath or the feeling of your heartbeat. Over time, your imagination may expand, but it’s not required to experience a deeply healing meditation.
The most important aspect is how you feel, and if you are seeing a pitch black mind image, but you feel peaceful, relaxed, or happy, then you definitely had a successful meditation.
7 Tips to Overcome Common Meditation Challenges
1. Let Go of Trying to Control the Mind
If I were to go back in time, when I first started to meditate, and give myself one piece of advice, that would be this: “Stop trying to control your mind.”
Trying to control your thoughts is like trying to stop a river from flowing using a few rocks; impossible. It can only lead to frustration, disappointment, and maybe even quitting the idea of meditating for good.
So if you can’t control the mind, then what can you do?
The “trick” is to be aware of the space between your thoughts. As the renowned teacher of the Bon Tibetan tradition, Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche explains in his deeply transformational book “Awakening the Luminous Mind”, to enter our inner refuge through our minds, we must focus on its spaciousness.
What this means is that if you just let the thoughts come and go without attaching to them and without feeling any resistance to them, you will begin to notice that there is something more to your mind than your thoughts. That they are like a train going on a railroad through a beautiful natural setting, and the true nature of your mind is the vast spaciousness all around the railroad, not the train itself.
Being aware of this space is a subtle realization at first, but with time and consistent practice, it becomes more easily noticeable. You can take this awareness and apply it to everyday life as well. Whenever a situation or a person triggers you to feel anxious, stressed, angry, or any other conflictual emotion, pause and take a few deep breaths while focusing on that spaciousness and notice how that gently balances your emotions.
2. Do a Movement Practice Beforehand
If you’re having a hard time sitting still during your meditation, then doing any kind of movement practice, whether that is stretching, yoga, tai chi, pilates, or any other that you enjoy, will help tremendously. If you’re not used to having a regular movement practice, then your muscles can get tense and your energy stagnant, and during your meditation, you can begin to feel those physical and energetic blockages more intensely. This can cause you to not be able to sit still, and might make you frustrated.
It’s important to realize that even if this happens, there’s no need to be harsh on yourself. It’s not a setback; it is just a way in which your body is telling you that it needs more nourishing movement. Even a short 10-15-minute yoga flow or light stretching session can be enough to get your energy flowing properly and release any small tensions. There’s no need for anything more complex if you don’t feel up for it or you simply don’t have enough time.
3. Avoid Judging Anything That Comes Up
One of the biggest challenges in meditation is the tendency to judge ourselves. Maybe you think, “I’m doing this wrong,” or “Why can’t I quiet my mind like everyone else?” But the truth is that the judging itself creates a far greater blockage than anything else that might arise.
This is because at the deepest level, everything is energy, and the energy that we have towards ourselves while meditating will be reflected to us during our practice. It is the same for everything we do in life; the more we judge ourselves, the more resistance we create around us, and attract people and situations that reflect our energy to teach us that we need to let go of it.
So let’s say you feel like it’s been a long time, and your thoughts are still racing, and self-judgement arises. In that moment, the best thing to do is to just let it be. Let it come and go without giving it any importance, and return to your breath.
Let your breath be the anchor, and instead of labeling your meditation as “good” or “bad,” simply be in a state of gentle observation. Notice what shows up with curiosity, as though you are watching waves move across the ocean. Every thought, every feeling, every sensation will pass if you let it flow.
The more you release judgment, the easier it becomes to stay present. And in that presence, you allow true transformation to unfold in your own sacred rhythm.
4. Focus on Your Feelings
When you meditate, it is most important to focus on what you feel, not on trying to forcefully visualize anything, or on what you think. Thoughts and images are surface-level, but your feelings carry the deeper messages from your inner world.
The deeper you allow yourself to sink into your feelings, the more you’ll discover that beneath all the noise of your emotions, there is a subtle peace that has always been and will always be there. And that is your true divine essence.
This inner peace is gentle and quiet, which is why it can be harder to notice than the louder, more imbalanced emotions. But even if you can’t always feel it, trust that it is always present, holding you through every experience. Meditation simply helps you connect to that eternal stillness, reminding you of what is already within.
If you’ve recently gone through something painful or traumatic, don’t rush yourself into “feeling good” again. You heal at your own pace, and that is perfectly alright. Remember that all emotions are our teachers, even the most painful ones that you would rather not feel. But the emotions that we avoid the most are often the ones that transform us most profoundly when we finally embrace them and realize the lessons behind them.
5. Have No Expectations and Be Grateful
If you go into a meditation with certain expectations in your mind, you are bound to have a disappointing experience. Not because you will do anything wrong, but because the energy of expecting a certain outcome inherently brings disappointment.
The best attitude to have towards your meditative practice is to go into it with an open heart and childlike curiosity, rather than a fixed idea of how things should play out. The moment you get into that expansive, curious energy, you are sending a signal to the universe to surprise you in the best possible way.
Finally, no matter how your meditation went, it is most important to be grateful and give thanks for everything that you experienced and for the things that made your experience possible. At the end of your practice, take a moment to appreciate your body, the time you could invest, your house, the Earth, and simply life itself, and that you get to live and experience all that this world has to offer, “good” or “bad”.
7. Give Back Some Love
Besides showing gratitude for the things in your life, another powerful thing that you can do is to take a moment to spread the harmonious state that you managed to achieve with the rest of creation. Even just setting an intention for any living being that needs some love and support to get some or sending some loving energy to someone or someplace you feel needs it, can be of great help.
Especially in today’s world, in which many people are becoming more and more selfish, the simple act of wanting to spread some love can be a very powerful healing force in the collective consciousness.
Integrating Your Meditation Practice Into Daily Life
Probably the most important aspect of your meditation practice is not what you experience during the sessions but how you integrate the experiences into your daily life. All the advice shared here is not only guidance for meditation, but for life itself. What you experience in your practice must be integrated into the way you live; otherwise, meditation can easily become an escape rather than a transformative spiritual practice.
If you feel peaceful on the cushion but lose your calm the moment someone frustrates you at work, then you haven’t yet managed to integrate your practice. This is where you can unknowingly slip into spiritual escapism, using meditation as a means to escape the world instead of a preparation to face your life from a place of authenticity and return to your inner harmony amongst life’s most difficult moments.
Your meditation is most profound when it shows up in the moments you’re most challenged. When anger rises, when anxiety tries to cripple you, when someone pushes your boundaries, those are the most important moments to return to your inner stillness and respond from harmony instead of reactivity. In these moments, you show yourself how deeply you’ve integrated your practice and which aspects still need more work.
Meditation isn’t about sitting in silence for hours or chasing a momentarily blissful feeling. It’s about cultivating the capacity to manifest your inner balance as much as you possibly can into every interaction, every challenge, and every present moment of your life.
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