One of the most challenging unknowns about choosing a meditation cushion is the height of the cushion for sitting meditation. When people first begin a practice, they can experience physical discomfort — pain in the shoulders, back, hips, knees, or ankles, or numbness in the buttocks and legs. Much of the time, the meditation cushion is the source of the discomfort because it directly affects the posture of the body. Sometimes there are physical causes within the body, but these can often be overcome with the right cushion and some thoughtful practice.
Factors Related to Meditation Cushion Height
There are generally four factors to consider when choosing the height of a meditation cushion: your height, your weight, your level of flexibility, and your level of experience with sitting meditation. Mitigating factors such as injuries, disabilities, or surgeries are outside the scope of this article — if you have special circumstances, we recommend seeking the advice of a medical professional.
How Your Height Factors In
In general, the taller you are, the higher the cushion you will need. Taller people typically have longer legs, which need more room to fold into a cross-legged posture. A taller cushion helps accommodate this. Our Zafu Meditation Cushion is about 7 inches tall — a good standard height for people between 5 and 6 feet tall. If you are closer to 5 feet, choose the buckwheat hull fill so you can remove some hulls and lower the cushion. If you are over 6 feet, you may want to add a support cushion under the Zafu to raise it further.
Our Cosmic Cushion comes in three heights: lowloft/travel size (4½ inches), regular lift (6½ inches), and oversize (7½ inches). The oversize is designed primarily for those who are 6’2” or taller, and especially for those who are 225 lbs or more. The lowloft and travel size are generally suited for those around 5’6” or shorter.
How Your Weight Factors In
Weight matters primarily because more weight compresses the cushion, effectively reducing its height. A heavier person will compress the fabric and fill — especially kapok — causing the cushion to sit lower. The oversize Cosmic Cushion is designed in part to compensate for this compression. Weight is only relevant insofar as it affects the cushion’s functional height when you are sitting on it.
How Your Flexibility Factors In
The most comfortable sitting meditation posture is one where your knees are level with or slightly lower than your hips. If your knees are up in the air, your lower back curves outward and your back, neck, and shoulder muscles have to work harder to maintain an upright posture — and the closed abdomen puts pressure on the bowels. If your knees drop significantly below your hips, the lower back curves inward too severely, causing lower back pain and forward lean.
To test your flexibility, sit on the floor in a cross-legged posture with no cushion. If your knees align with your hips or drop toward the floor, you have good flexibility. If your knees stay somewhat in the air, you have average to limited flexibility. If your knees stay nearly straight up, your flexibility is very limited — common in men, who typically have narrower hips and shorter hamstrings than women.
Limited flexibility is not an indication that you are out of shape or unhealthy. People who run, bike, or hike frequently often have less flexibility. Yoga practitioners tend to have above average flexibility. And some people are simply built that way. The correlation is straightforward: more flexibility requires less cushion height; less flexibility requires more.
How Your Meditation Experience Factors In
We offer some minimalistic cushions with just a few inches of lift, such as our Heavenly Buckwheat Bean and our Rectangular Meditation Cushion. These lower cushions suit those with above-average flexibility, but also those with significant meditation experience who have found they are comfortable with less lift. As your practice deepens — and especially if you incorporate yoga — your flexibility and ability to adapt to discomfort will improve. That said, even experienced meditators can still encounter discomfort and leg numbness during meditation.
Very few people find perfect comfort the first time they sit on a new meditation cushion. I hope this article helps you make a more informed choice. If you’re also unsure about which fill is best for you, be sure to read our article on Kapok vs. Buckwheat Hulls.
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