About Diana

Diana Winston is the director of UCLA Mindful, the mindfulness education center of UCLA Health, and the author of The Little Book of Being: Practices and Guidance for Uncovering Your Natural Awareness. A sought-after speaker, Diana has been called by the Los Angeles Times “one of the nation’s best-known teachers of mindfulness." She has taught mindfulness since 1993 in a variety of settings including hospitals, universities, corporations, nonprofits, and schools in the US and Asia. During her 17-year tenure at UCLA's Mindful Awareness Research Center, Diana developed the evidence-based Mindful Awareness Practices (MAPS) curriculum and the Training in Mindfulness Facilitation program which trained more than 500 mindfulness teachers worldwide. She is a founding board member of the International Mindfulness Teachers Association.

Her work has been featured in the New York Times, NPR, O Magazine, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, Bloomberg, Women’s Health, and in a variety of magazines, books, and journals. She is also the author of Wide Awake: A Buddhist Guide for Teens, Glimpses of Being, and the co-author, with Susan Smalley PhD, of Fully Present: The Science, Art and Practice of Mindfulness, and has published numerous articles on mindfulness. She is considered one of the early founders of meditation programs and retreats for youth. Her meditations have a global reach through UCLA Mindful and other apps, and recently her meditations have become a feature of the California governor’s mental health website.

Diana is a member of the Teacher's Council at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Northern California where she was trained to teach by Jack Kornfield. She has been practicing mindfulness meditation since 1989, including a year as a Buddhist nun in Burma. She is a graduate of Brown University. 

Currently, Diana’s most challenging and rewarding practice involves trying to mindfully parent her teenage daughter.

Diana enjoys a daily dog-walking meditation with her rescue terripoo Bamboo. 

Diana, Mallika Chopra, and Tamara Levitt join Larry King to discuss the latest in the mindfulness field.