Last year’s congressional retreat was Hanh’s second. The first, in 2003, was attended by nine members. Among them was Ohio Democratic Representative Tim Ryan, who sits on a cushion and meditates for 45 minutes in the morning before leaving for work. “My thoughts will carry me away ... and then you just try to come back to your breath,” Ryan told me. “Because the only moment you have is the present moment.” He continued, “The best thing you can do for your future is to be here in the present, and that will affect the decisions that you make, because you’ll be making them based on clarity, on what’s going on right now.” Ryan was raised Catholic, and he hasn’t left the Church, but meditation has “changed everything” for him. “It helps me resolve conflicts better than I used to,” he says. “You don’t hold onto [things] as much. If someone says something nasty to you, you let it go.” Ryan is now writing a book called A Mindful Nation: How a Simple Practice Can Help Us Reduce Stress, Improve Performance, and Recapture the American Spirit.
