What is wrong with meditation?

Just Google the word meditation and you will see thousands of results telling you how to meditate, when to meditate and how long to meditate. You will see how meditation can be used to cope with anxiety, sleeping disorder, stress, loneliness, depression, heart diseases, and to increase relaxation, awareness, self-identity, peace and all the rest of it. Meditation is also claimed to be a path towards enlightenment and self-realization. Different religions practice different kinds of meditations. There is Hindu meditation, Jain meditation, Buddhist meditation, Taoist meditation, Jewish meditation, etc. The so-called enlightened people in turn developed their own ways of meditation too.

The word meditation is being used interchangeably with the words mindfulness, awareness, consciousness, alertness, concentration, attention, etc. Hence, it's very difficult for one to define meditation.

If you have noticed meditation is the only belief that has been accepted by different religions, different countries, scientists, medical professionals, mystics, etc; Although, the techniques and the goals to meditate vary. One could easily say that meditation has the potential to unite the world.

In the ancient times meditation was purely a spiritual practice performed to go beyond the mind and attain blissfulness (Whatever that is). Meditation attained a lot of attention after doctors, gurus, scientists starting endorsing meditation to general public as a means to attain spiritual, mental and physical benefits. The westerners mainly were very attracted to meditation. Very soon meditation has become a commodity. Meditation centers were opened by different spiritual teachers, and offered different courses too.

When there are so many benefits, what actually is wrong with meditation? - The very idea of meditating to achieve something. How is it helpful when you meditate for an hour or 2 in a day and spend the rest of the day mechanically without being mindful? It's the same thing as exercising for a few hours in a day and spending all day eating junk and resting on bed.

The very meaning of meditation is to be aware of the present fully. When you force your mind to be mindful, you are literally being mindful of being mindful, then how can you be mindful of the present? Read it twice and thrice.

"Conscious meditation is no meditation. To deliberately sit down and repeat mantras means nothing. That is not meditation, that is a cheap escape" - JK

Man has always been looking for something beyond the mind to escape the various problems that mind creates. And, meditation promised everything man has ever wanted. As I see it, meditation is merely an illusion to get distracted from the reality; Just like God and religion.

Meditation is simply being aware of what you are doing. Where ever you go take yourself. What ever you do, be mindful of it. When you eat, just eat. When you sleep, just sleep. When you think, just think. I hope you get the gist of it. 

You don't need tools, techniques, guides, gurus, courses, manuals to teach you how to meditate. Because, meditation isn't a goal to achieve, but it's a way of living.