How to Meditate: A Beginner's Guide That Actually Works

To meditate as a beginner, sit upright but relaxed, follow your breath for five to ten minutes, and when your mind wanders, notice it and come back to the breath. That return is not a failure of the practice. It is the practice. Everything below is detail: where the instructions come from, how to set up, what to do when it feels hard, and how to end well.

What meditation is (and isn't)

"Meditation" covers many practices. The one in this guide is the simplest and most widely taught: resting your attention on one object, the breath, and gently bringing it back each time it drifts. In Pali this kind of practice is called samatha (calm-abiding). In Tibetan Buddhism it is shi-nè, with the same meaning. Buddhist traditions pair it with insight practice, which looks at how experience works. We will keep to the first. If you want a practice built around wishing others well, see the loving-kindness meditation guide.

It is not about emptying your mind, and it is not about feeling a particular way. Some days will feel calm. Many will not. Zen traditions also teach an approach of sitting without a specific object, called zazen; this article does not cover it.

Set up: where, when, how long

• Where: somewhere quiet enough that you will not be interrupted. A corner of a bedroom is fine.
• When: whenever you can repeat it. Many people choose the morning, before the day fills up, but the best time is the one you will keep.
• How long: five to ten minutes. Both Mindful.org and Lion's Roar suggest short sessions for beginners. Start with five.
• Posture: a chair or a cushion. Sit with your back upright but not stiff, hands resting on your lap or knees, and your eyes softly closed or looking down a short distance ahead.

The posture advice is old. In the Anapanasati Sutta (sutta means a discourse attributed to the Buddha; anapanasati means mindfulness of breathing), in Thanissaro Bhikkhu's translation, the practitioner goes to a secluded place, sits down "folding his legs crosswise," keeps the body erect, and sets mindfulness to the fore. That is a Theravada source, from the Pali Canon (Majjhima Nikaya 118). You do not need to fold your legs. Upright and comfortable is the point.

Step by step: meditating on the breath

The first of the sixteen steps in the Anapanasati Sutta, in Thanissaro Bhikkhu's translation, is simply to breathe in and out mindfully, noticing a long breath as long and a short breath as short. The sutta arranges its sixteen steps in four groups: body, feelings, mind, and mental qualities (dhammas). You are starting with the first. The breath also appears as the first body contemplation in the Satipatthana Sutta (MN 10, translated by Nyanasatta Thera, a different translation from the one above).

Modern teachers turn this into a short routine. Mindful.org and Lion's Roar both give a similar one, and this version follows their shared shape:

1. Settle. Take your posture. Let your shoulders drop. Take one slightly deeper breath if you like, then let your breathing go back to normal.
2. Find the breath. Notice where it is clearest: the nostrils, the chest, or the belly. Pick one place.
3. Follow it. Stay with the sensation of each in-breath and each out-breath. Lion's Roar suggests giving a little extra attention to the out-breath, which can make the rest easier to follow.
4. Notice when you drift. You will start thinking about lunch, an email, an argument. This will happen within seconds. It is normal.
5. Label it. Silently say "thinking." Lion's Roar teaches this label as a way of noticing without judging.
6. Come back. Return to the breath. Then repeat steps 3 to 6 for the rest of your time. Open your eyes slowly when you finish.

Do not try to control the breath or make it deeper. Just watch it.

When the mind wanders: restlessness and dullness

Everyone drifts. The Tibetan tradition has a precise way of describing what goes wrong, and it is useful even in your first week. This is Tibetan and Mahayana scholastic material, rooted in a text attributed to Maitreya (the Madhyantavibhaga) and explained by teachers such as Thubten Chodron. It is not part of the Pali breath instructions above.

Two obstacles are named:

• Excitement (restlessness). The mind is jumpy, pulled toward thoughts and plans. The attention is too tight, or too scattered.
• Laxity (dullness). The mind is foggy, drowsy, or vague. The attention is too slack.

According to Thubten Chodron's presentation, the remedies point in opposite directions. With excitement the mind is too tight, so you loosen it. With laxity the mind is too relaxed, so you tighten it a little and brighten it. The list in the tradition is longer (five faults and eight antidotes), but this tighten-or-loosen idea is enough to start with.

How to do that in practice is general advice rather than something from her text. If you are restless, try relaxing your effort and slowing down. If you are dull, try sitting a little straighter and bringing more interest to the sensation of the breath.

Seen this way, a "bad" session is not a failed one. It is information about whether your attention was too tight or too slack, and you can adjust.

Your first week: a simple plan

Keep it small enough that you cannot talk yourself out of it.

• Days 1 to 3: five minutes, same time each day.
• Days 4 to 6: add a couple of minutes if it feels easy. If not, stay at five.
• Day 7: sit for as long as you like up to ten minutes, then write down in a line or two what you noticed.

Consistency matters more than length. Five minutes every day teaches you more than one long session you dread. The goal of the week is not a calm mind. It is a habit of sitting down.

End well: a one-minute dedication

Before you get up, take one minute to share the good of the session. In the Mahayana and Tibetan traditions this is called dedication of merit: you pause, feel glad you sat, and direct the benefit of the practice toward others as well as yourself. Generic beginner guides tend to skip it, but it turns a stopwatch ending into a deliberate one. For a fuller explanation, read What Is Dedication of Merit?.

After your five minutes, Rejoy lets you track the session and record a short dedication, by voice or text. That gives each session a small, deliberate ending, and over time you can look back at what you dedicated your practice to. Rejoy does not guide meditation sessions or teach technique; it supports the habit around them.

Practice exercise: a five-minute breath session

Try this today.

1. 0:00 to 0:30. Sit upright on a chair or cushion. Let your hands rest. Close your eyes or lower your gaze.
2. 0:30 to 1:00. Take a couple of natural breaths and notice where you feel them most clearly.
3. 1:00 to 4:00. Follow each in-breath and out-breath. When you notice you have drifted, silently say "thinking" and return. Do this as many times as needed. Count it as practice each time.
4. 4:00 to 4:30. Let go of the focus. Feel your body sitting where it is.
5. 4:30 to 5:00. Dedicate: think of one person or "all beings" and silently wish them well, for example "may whatever good came from this sit be of benefit to others."

Common questions

Do I need to be Buddhist to meditate? No. This guide draws on Buddhist sources and says where each idea comes from, but the breath instructions work for anyone. If the Buddhist ideas behind it interest you, What Is Karma? is a good next read. Mindful.org teaches a secular version of the same basic steps.

Eyes open or closed? Either. Mindful.org says eyes open with a soft downward gaze or closed are both fine, and Lion's Roar teaches a gaze lowered a few feet ahead. Closed eyes can reduce distraction; a lowered, open gaze is a good option if you find your eyes closed leads to drifting.

What if I fall asleep? That is a form of the dullness described above; Thubten Chodron lists drowsiness among its stronger forms. Try sitting a little straighter, keeping your gaze lowered rather than closed, or choosing a different time of day. These are general suggestions, not part of her text.

Is meditation safe for everyone? For most people it is low risk, but not for everyone. The US National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) says meditation is usually considered to have few risks, and also notes that in an analysis of more than 6,000 participants, about 8 percent reported negative effects, mostly anxiety or depression. If meditation leaves you distressed, stop and speak to a qualified health professional or an experienced teacher. Meditation is not a substitute for medical or mental health care.

Sources

• Anapanasati Sutta: Mindfulness of Breathing (MN 118), tr. Thanissaro Bhikkhu, Access to Insight.
• Satipatthana Sutta: The Foundations of Mindfulness (MN 10), tr. Nyanasatta Thera, Access to Insight.
• Thubten Chodron, "The Five Faults and Eight Antidotes."
• Mindful.org, "How to Meditate."
• Lion's Roar, "How to Meditate."
• NCCIH, "8 Things to Know About Meditation and Mindfulness."