Organic Meditation Pillows

Yogis everywhere are becoming more conscious of their environmental footprint, as well as the harmful effects that toxins and chemicals have on their bodies.

Zafu’s have been used for meditation since the early 1900s. Used for cross-legged and kneeling postures. The curved edges allow your legs to drop off the edges at the hip joints so that your knees are lower than your hips, which makes it easier for your spine to maintain its natural curves.  The height of a zafu cushion makes traditional sitting positions easier and more stable.

There are so many meditation pillows out there that claim to be green, eco-friendly, and safer. Still, they are not completely toxin-free, because made with petroleum materials.

Conventional Meditation Pillows

Avoid conventional meditation pillows made with toxic materials, including synthetic-derived flame retardants, heavy metals, formaldehyde, or phthalates. Made of polyurethane foam, memory foam, flame retardants, or other questionable chemicals! Or synthetic fabrics which are often treated with perfluorinated compounds (PFAS) plus various anti-bacterial biocidal treatments and even flame retardants. 

Conventional Cotton Meditation Pillows: They are made with cotton grown with chemical fertilizers and pesticides, and hence aren’t a good choice for yogis who are concerned about their health, safety, and impact on the environment. Conventional cotton often has many added chemical treatments during the production process as well.

❌ Polyurethane Foam: This cheap, unhealthy foam is highly toxic, synthetic, polluting, and petroleum by-products, meaning they are derived from fossil fuels. Polyurethane is made from petroleum chemicals that can emit VOCs—harmful chemicals that can cause respiratory irritation or other health problems. Polyurethane is often mixed with other harmful compounds such as formaldehyde, boric acid, polyvinyl chloride, and other petrochemicals.

❌ Memory Foam: Memory foam (or viscoelastic foam) is another type of polyurethane foam with chemicals added to give it unique conforming properties. Both Memory foam and Flexible polyurethane foam are polyurethane foams. These cheap, unhealthy foams are petroleum products, meaning they are derived from fossil fuels.

❌ Polyester: another synthetic and petroleum product derived from fossil fuels. This foam is toxic and polluting.

❌ PFAS: synthetic fabrics which are often treated with perfluorinated compounds (PFAS) plus various anti-bacterial biocidal treatments and even flame retardants.

❌ Flame Retardants: the most common include brominated flame retardants, chlorinated flame retardants, and phosphate flame retardants. Brominated flame retardants are often added to polyurethane foam. Chlorinated flame retardants are often added to the fabric of mattresses, as well as to the filling. Phosphate flame retardants are often added to the padding of mattresses.

Greenwashing Meditation Pillows

Avoid greenwashing meditation pillows made by brands that pretend to be organic, natural, sustainable, or safer when they are not. They will use their misleading marketing tricks to convince you to buy their products.

Greenwashing is when a brand pretends to be organic, green, natural, or sustainable when it is not! 

Bamboo Meditation Pillows: It isn’t natural or chemical-free. To transform hard bamboo lumber (we love bamboo plants for making furniture, etc) into a soft pulpy fiber, many acids and chemicals are used. The FDA has ruled that a manufacturer cannot use bamboo fiber as a label; instead, they are required to label such products as “manmade rayon fiber from the bamboo plant.” 

 Soybeans Foam: this foam is derived from conventional bean crops and is usually full of pesticides, so avoid that too. 

❌ Plant-based foam: typically produced with a small percentage of soybean oil or castor oil mixed with petroleum chemicals. It is often marketed as “environmentally friendly,” but plant-based foams emit VOCs just like polyurethane foam.

❌ Polyethylene foam: Polyethylene foam can contain fewer contaminants compared to polyurethane foam. It can be made from petroleum-based or bio-based ingredients. Even if they say natural or even organic without a certification is hard to prove it! That’s why I don’t recommend any brands not disclose or show their Organic Certification. These certifications are very rigorous and expensive, so not many want to go through that or can pass their strict requirements!

​❌ Synthetic Natural Rubber: made of petroleum-based materials, including 1,3-butadiene, a human carcinogen.

Natural Rubber: even though they are made from rubber trees, they are involved in vulcanizing agents and chemical additives during the manufacturing process. Those agents and additives are unknown.

Organic Meditation Pillows

Conventional or Greenwashing meditation Pillows can contain harmful chemicals, petroleum, and toxic and unhealthy materials, and consequently, they may have a chemical smell!  Here you won’t find any toxic Memory Foam, unhealthy Gel Filled, or Latex pillows mixed with other TOXIC ingredients, no synthetic latex or chemicals.​

 

✅ GOLS Certification: The Global Organic Latex Standard (GOLS) is a materials and processing standard for organic latex and finished latex foam. In addition to the use of organic raw material, this standard also concentrates on human health, safety, and welfare, and the environment in the manufacturing process of organic latex products. The best certification for a foam mattress. 

 

 

GOLS logo, certified organic latex mattress

 

 

✅ GOTS Certification: The Global Organic Textile Standard (GOTS) is the world’s leading processing standard for organic textiles and fibers, including ecological and social criteria, backed by independent certification of the entire textile supply chain. 

 

GOTS seal Certified Organic logo

The Best GOTS Certified Organic Meditation Pillows

On this page, I have listed the most eco-friendly meditation pillow brands on the market!

 

Shop with my links to support my research!💖

Review March 21 2025