Most introductions to meditation describe benefits. The traditions themselves are considerably franker: they have detailed literatures on obstacles, on stages of practice that are frankly unpleasant, and on the conditions under which practice goes wrong.

This article covers difficulty at four levels, from the ordinary to the serious.

Level one: the five hindrances #

The standard obstacles, named in every tradition, each with a prescribed antidote. These are not problems; they are the material.

Sensual desire (kamacchanda) — the mind pulled towards pleasant prospects. The classical antidote is reflection on the body’s unattractiveness; a gentler modern one is simply noting the wanting as wanting and returning.

Ill will (byapada) — irritation with the practice, the posture, the noise, oneself. Antidote: loving-kindness.

Sloth and torpor (thina-middha) — dullness, sleepiness, heaviness. Antidote: energy, brighter attention, opening the eyes, walking meditation, and — unromantically — more sleep.

Restlessness and worry (uddhacca-kukkucca) — agitation, and the specific worry of remorse over past conduct. Antidote: tranquillity, and for the worry component, ethical repair. The placement of sila before samadhi in the path is precisely about this.

Doubt (vicikiccha) — uncertainty about whether the practice works or whether one is doing it right. Antidote: investigation, instruction, and a teacher.

The canonical similes describe how each affects clarity: water coloured with dye, water boiling, water choked with weeds, water whipped by wind, water muddied and left in the dark.

Two things to notice. Every hindrance is expected — their arising is not a sign of failure. And the practice is to recognise the hindrance, not to defeat it: naming it accurately is most of the work.

Level two: the ordinary discouragements #

Below the level of doctrine, the common difficulties are mundane and worth naming.

“My mind won’t stop.” It will not. The instruction is not to stop thinking but to notice when attention has wandered and return it. The noticing is the practice; a session with fifty returns is fifty repetitions of the exercise, not fifty failures.

“I’m not getting anywhere.” Progress in meditation is not linear and is largely invisible from inside. The traditional check is not what happens on the cushion but what happens off it — whether reactivity has lessened, whether difficult states pass more quickly. Those change slowly and are noticed by other people first.

Boredom. Frequently a form of restlessness, and frequently the point at which something is about to shift. The instruction is to be interested in the boredom.

Physical pain. Posture matters, and much pain is a posture problem rather than a practice problem. Persistent sharp pain, as against dull discomfort, should be respected; the tradition has no stake in damaging your knees.

Losing the habit. The single most common failure, and the one with the most reliable remedy: a shorter daily sit that actually happens beats a longer one that does not.

Level three: the difficult stages #

Here the traditions have their own literature, and it is often startling to practitioners who meet these stages without warning.

The Visuddhimagga maps the progress of insight through a series of knowledges. After the early stages — in which arising and passing become vivid and practice is often exhilarating — comes a sequence the commentary describes plainly:

Dissolution — phenomena are perceived as ceasing rather than arising, and experience takes on a dissolving, unstable quality. Fear — the perception of everything as dissolving produces genuine fear. Misery — everything appears as unsatisfactory. Disgust — aversion to all conditioned things. Desire for deliverance — an urgent wish to get out. Re-observation — a difficult, often agitated phase of renewed effort.

Then equanimity about formations, which is described as spacious and effortless, and the path stages beyond.

This sequence has been called the “dukkha ñanas” and, in Western practice communities following Daniel Ingram’s usage, the dark night. Practitioners passing through it report low mood, anxiety, derealisation, and a pervasive sense of wrongness that can last weeks or months.

Two points matter practically.

The tradition regards this as progress, and as a phase to be passed through rather than a sign that something has gone wrong. The classical advice is to keep practising with guidance rather than to stop.

The classical advice assumes a container. The Visuddhimagga’s practitioner is a monastic, in a monastery, with a teacher who has been through it, with no job, and with an entire community that understands what is happening. A lay practitioner in the same territory, alone, after a ten-day retreat, is in a substantially different situation, and the same advice may not transfer.

There is also a genuine question, not settled, about whether every episode described this way is in fact the classical sequence. Depression, anxiety, and depersonalisation exist independently of meditation, and a framework that interprets all distress as insight progress can delay appropriate help.

Level four: adverse effects #

Until recently, secular meditation programmes said essentially nothing about harm. This has changed.

The Varieties of Contemplative Experience study, led by Willoughby Britton and Jared Lindahl at Brown University and published in PLOS ONE in 2017, interviewed practitioners and teachers across traditions and catalogued a wide range of meditation-related difficulties: changes in perception, affect, and sense of self; cognitive changes; somatic effects including involuntary movements and energy phenomena; and social and occupational impairment. Duration ranged from days to years.

Notably, difficulties were reported by practitioners without prior psychiatric history, at various levels of experience, and across practice types.

Prevalence is not well established. Estimates in the literature for clinically significant adverse effects in meditation programmes cluster somewhere around 5–10%, with much higher rates of transient unpleasant experience. Intensive retreat conditions carry higher risk than eight-week courses.

Who is at higher risk:

  • People with trauma histories. Sustained silent attention to bodily sensation can be destabilising when the body is where the trauma is held, and the absence of distraction removes coping strategies that were doing necessary work.
  • People with psychotic or dissociative conditions, or a family history. Intensive practice can precipitate episodes.
  • People in acute crisis — recent bereavement, active suicidality, ongoing danger.
  • People doing long intensive retreats without prior grounding, particularly the ten-day silent format as a first experience of practice.

Trauma #

This deserves separate treatment, because it is the most common serious issue and the most tractable.

The difficulty is structural rather than incidental. Standard instructions ask a practitioner to bring sustained, non-distracted attention to present bodily experience, to remain still, to refrain from speaking, and to observe whatever arises without acting on it. For someone whose nervous system holds trauma, several of those are the conditions under which the trauma resurfaces, and the usual escape routes are closed.

Trauma-sensitive adaptations exist and are well developed. David Treleaven’s work is the standard reference. The main modifications:

  • Choice of anchor. The breath is not neutral for everyone; sound, the feet, or the hands are alternatives.
  • Eyes open is permitted and often better.
  • Titration — short periods, with breaks, rather than long unbroken sits.
  • Movement permitted, and walking practice preferred at times.
  • Grounding and orienting — deliberately noticing the room, the exits, present safety.
  • Explicit permission to stop.

None of this is a departure from the tradition, which has always adjusted instruction to the person.

When to stop, and what to do #

Signs that practice should be paused and help sought:

  • Persistent derealisation or depersonalisation that does not resolve after sessions.
  • Sleep disruption that is worsening.
  • Intrusive imagery or flashbacks.
  • Mood that is deteriorating over weeks rather than fluctuating.
  • Inability to function at work or in relationships.
  • Any thought of self-harm.

What helps: stopping or substantially reducing formal practice; grounding practices instead of concentrative ones; more physical activity, food, and sleep — teachers in several traditions recommend heavier meals and vigorous exercise specifically for this; contact with people; and telling an experienced teacher exactly what is happening.

A teacher matters here more than anywhere. Someone who has seen a hundred practitioners through difficulty can distinguish a classical stage from a clinical problem far better than a book can. This is the most concrete argument for finding a teacher rather than practising from apps alone.

And clinical help is not a failure. The traditions did not have access to it; there is no virtue in declining it. Several well-known teachers are explicit that medication and therapy are appropriate alongside practice.

Common questions #

Is difficulty a sign of progress? Sometimes, and the framing can be dangerous if applied universally. The classical stages are real; so is ordinary depression. Distinguishing them requires someone experienced, and defaulting to the flattering interpretation is a poor policy.

Should beginners do a ten-day retreat? Many people do and find it valuable. It is nonetheless an intensive intervention, and doing it as a first serious practice experience, without a prior daily practice or a screening conversation, carries more risk than the format’s popularity suggests.

Is meditation safe for everyone? No, and the claim that it is was always a marketing position rather than a finding. Most people are fine; a minority are not; the traditions knew this and the secular programmes are catching up.

What if I just don’t like it? That is permitted. The tradition contains chanting, study, generosity, devotion, and ethical practice, all of which are Buddhist practice. The assumption that meditation is what Buddhism consists of is recent.

Sources & further reading #

David A. Treleaven, Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness (Norton, 2018) — the standard practical guide. Jared Lindahl, Nathan Fisher, David Cooper, Rochelle Rosen & Willoughby Britton, “The Varieties of Contemplative Experience,” PLOS ONE 12 (2017). Buddhaghosa, The Path of Purification, trans. Bhikkhu Nanamoli (BPS, 4th ed. 2010), ch. 21 — the classical account of the difficult insight knowledges. Bhikkhu Analayo, Satipaṭṭhāna: The Direct Path to Realization (Windhorse, 2003) — on the hindrances in practice. Willoughby Britton, “Can Mindfulness Be Too Much of a Good Thing?” Current Opinion in Psychology 28 (2019).