Lots of studies have shown that regular meditation will help to reduce your stress levels and generally improve your health by helping you to relax. But, in today's busy society, does it pay you to set aside time for a daily meditation session?

The short answer to that question is a resounding "yes".

The longer answer is that it will depend on you and your attitude to the idea of escaping from your life's routine for 15 minutes or more each day.

But even that isn't the complete answer. If you resent the idea of meditating each day - maybe in the same way as being forced to eat your greens as a child - then that isn't the best way to start your practice. If that's the case for you, then a better target would be to meditate a few times a week or, if that's too much to ask, as little as once or twice a week.

That said, there are almost certainly elements of your daily routine that could be swapped into meditation time. Watching the daily news is one of them - the news is sending negative energy to you anyway, so if you can take it out of your life, that's good. If anything big or important happens, you'll find out soon enough anyway.

The big advantage of meditating daily is that you'll find yourself becoming more relaxed as a person. Simply setting aside 20 minutes or so will make a tremendous difference to you both in terms of your outlook on life and also how your body reacts to the pressures of life.

The positive effect on your health is more than worth the handful of minutes you set aside. And after a while, you'll begin to wonder how you could ever have coped without it!