Diane Stallings provides meditation sessions every second and fourth Tuesday of the month at the Fountain Hills Library conference room. Beginning at 5 p.m., these free, 30-minute classes are intended to be an introduction to meditation for people of any age and experience.

Stallings’ meditation classes focus on practicing mindfulness and sharing self-healing topics for anyone feeling overworked, overburdened or just needing a break from their day. For Stallings, it’s a way to relieve her stress.

“I’m a nurse and I was working intensive care, and a friend suggested to me that I might like to try just a one-minute meditation,” Stallings said, who began to practice one minute of meditation before work each morning.

“My life was so busy that it was kind of a surprise to find that just listening to the breath, I could find a good feeling that was just there for no particular reason,” Stallings said. “There was a calm place and I can get to it.”

As things stayed crazy around the ICU, Stallings began holding her head high, feeling in control of her day.

After 37 years of nursing, Stallings credits that first minute of meditation for a significant reduction in stress, feeling grounded in the fact that no matter how busy her day might be, she could deal with whatever came her way.

“The brain is busy and is always sorting things out, constantly,” she said. “This is sort of taking a break from your brain.”

After moving to Fountain Hills in 1992, Stallings began teaching meditation at a yoga studio. When the studio closed, Stallings continued her group meditation classes at the library.

“I always try to bring something a little more fresh,” she said.

Meditation, according to Stallings, is an effort to build one’s inner observer. It’s a deeper version of oneself that is found at times sitting quietly at the bottom of a river looking up at a boat or flying high in a hot air balloon looking down below.

“The imagery is to help people focus on something and to stay on a path…in particular giving them something to do so that they’re not thinking about that jerk in the grocery store,” Stalling said.

According to Stallings, meditation has worked to boost serotonin, reduce stress levels and drop blood pressure.

While many studies preface that more research is needed to apply concrete solutions to issues like hypertension and stress, Stallings is correct in that several studies have uncovered the positive effects of simply taking time to sit and breathe.

A 2020 meta-analysis compiled 14 studies that found meditation-based practices were effective at meaningfully reducing blood pressure in people with non-communicable diseases.

A 2018 clinical trial funded by the U.S. Department of Defense released data showing meditation was effective at reducing PTSD symptoms and depression in 203 veterans with PTSD.

And in 2017, Mayo Clinic began testing the effects of meditation on emotional buoyancy and burnout in physicians.

While the results of this study have yet to be released it, along with a growing number of studies, reveals a shift in attention towards the benefits of mindfulness practices like meditation from the medical community, for the medical community.

“You just breathe with the situation as it is, and that’s it,” Dr. Roberto P. Benzo said in an interview with Mayo Clinic, who served as the principal investigator for the study. “It’s for everyone. It’s not for enlightened people, for monks, this is for people who are very busy.”

As a nurse with a daily meditation practice, Stallings found the more she meditated, the easier it was to find calm.

Stalling has accumulated all her musings and meditations in a blog with posts dating back to 2007, which she shares with her meditation class. She decided to compile a selection of her blogposts into a book entitled “Calm Comfort Meditations.”

Much to her surprise, Stallings’ book was a finalist for the Indie Book Awards, the world’s largest literary awards program that recognizes authors of exceptional independently published books.

“Calm Comfort Meditations” is available on Amazon in paperback or eBook. To read more about Stallings, visit her website at joystream.net, or visit her blog at joystreamhealth.wordpress.com. For a special treat, enjoy a handful of online meditations recorded by Stallings at soundcloud.com/diane-stallings.

Join Stallings at the Library every second and fourth Tuesday of the month at 5 p.m. to reap the benefits of a few minutes of deep breathing.

“There’s just so much tension in the world now, I think we all need to relax. We’re going to get there,” Stallings said.

The front cover of her book depicts the moon and a dark cloud with a rainbow arcing toward Earth.

“I took that pic one afternoon on my way to teach meditation at the library,” Stallings said. “I’m like ‘hey, that’s just what I want to tell people; there’s light here and it’s available.’”