Even the Buddha experienced challenges with meditation: Historical texts reveal its potential downsides

A scholar of Buddhist medicine compiled centuries of Asian texts documenting what practitioners called 'meditation sickness,' from the Buddha's own recorded headaches to a fifth-century Khotanese scripture describing meditators who 'went mad' when startled during deep practice. One account from the Samyukta Agama describes monks who died by suicide after a meditation the Buddha had taught, prompting him to revise his instructions.

The research, published in a 2026 sourcebook, arrives as modern psychologists at Brown University have documented similar adverse effects among Western practitioners, with estimates ranging from 5% to 65% depending on the study. The historical texts also describe remedies, including grounding techniques and visualization, that traditional teachers used to treat these effects.

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