On Mindful Democracy: Jeremy David Engels with Diana Winston

Join us for a conversation with Jeremy David Engels, author of On Mindful Democracy!

Jeremy will be joined by Diana Winston, Director of UCLA Mindful, for a conversation about Engels' new book, mindfulness, what we can do in a fractured democracy, community care, and more. Jeremy will be answering questions and signing books.

About the book:

An antidote to political burnout and civic despair: drawing on mindfulness and modern wisdom to cultivate resilience, healthy engagement, and skillful presence in turbulent times.

A compact, beautifully designed guide offering 27 powerful teachings of interdependence to navigate news, social media, and civic engagement with clarity and courage.

250 years after the US Declaration of Independence, this incisive Declaration of Interdependence is a timely, tender, and transformative guide for citizens who care deeply about the world but feel disillusioned by the state of public discourse. Professor Jeremy David Engels—scholar, mindfulness teacher, and longtime student of Thich Nhat Hanh—proposes that clarity and interconnection are not only paths to personal peace, but vital practices for renewing democracy itself.

Structured in the spirit of On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder, this compact, accessible book delivers 27 profound insights—each a short chapter—on how to show up for democracy with compassion, clarity, and courage. It invites readers to step away from enemyship, to root their activism in shared humanity, and to declare their interdependence.

Readers will discover:

• How mindfulness can heal the civic wounds of polarization and fear
• Practices for engaging with news and social media without being consumed
• A reimagining of democracy as collective empowerment, not endless conflict
• Zen stories and teachings to inspire transformation
• Practical tips for showing up skillfully in moments of disagreement and tension

Whether you’re a seasoned activist or a tender-hearted citizen seeking a new path forward, this luminous testament to resilience offers a lantern in the dark—and a quiet call to remember who we are, and what we’re here to do, together.

About the participants:

Jeremy David Engels is the author of six books, including the newly released On Mindful Democracy: A Declaration of Interdependence to Mend a Fractured World (Parallax, 2026). He is the Liberal Arts Endowed Professor of Communication Arts & Sciences at Penn State University, co-founder of Yoga Lab, and a mindfulness and yoga teacher. Engels’ research reimagines democracy as a communal practice rooted in care, deliberation, and shared responsibility, emphasizing mindfulness as a core civic skill. His work has earned the Karl Wallace Award, the New Investigator Award from the National Communication Association, and Penn State’s Outstanding Tenure-Line Faculty Teaching Award.

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.

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