These are all pretty common points of contention for beginners.
Barring extreme cases, like people with psychotic disorders like schizophrenia, I believe meditation is beneficial, and not harmful, for virtually everyone.
I'm certain you've experienced a state of flow before and found equanimity in the process.
Meditation at its core is being able to drop back into that experience at your own convenience.
No, I'm aware of the mindfulness stuff. I just mentioned the sleep stuff as an aside. My flow states are usually associated with work or exercise. The former is high stress.though even if the brain is off
You've set yourself a goal, which is antithetical to the nature of meditation.
The goal (which is besides the point) you've set is totally unrealistic. For a beginner to sit and let their mind become empty is the equivalent of an average person waking up tomorrow and deciding to run a double marathon.
One reason meditation is helpful is that we become more efficient at letting go of unhelpful thoughts. Your reason for not wanting to do meditation, is the reason you should do meditation. It's a catch 22.
If you ever decide to try again, it might be helpful to set some realistic goals, temporarily.
See if you can let your mind become as empty as you can, for a whole second. If that's easy, try two seconds (this is harder than it sounds, but definitely within the capacity of beginners).
Other goals might be to not hold on to any thought for longer than ten seconds before returning your attention to the breath for the duration of the practice.
If you practice enough, you'll intuitively understand the goals aren't important and are just more unhelpful thoughts.