Buddhists

I was talking to a friend about that famous book "The Power of Now". My friend said that the basis of Erik Tolle's philosopy is Buddhist. I wondered. This afternoon I read a long complicated article about it and was fascinated. Then I found an 81 minute video article on my "Speaking of Faith" web site - Matthieu Ricard was the guy being interviewed - very likeable and clever. I think a lot of physicists become Buddhists, because the philosophy seems to involve physics - stuff like the universe, and quarks, and grains of sand and everything in life interconnecting. He looks like the Dali Lama, and has been called the "happiest man in the world". He is embarrassed by this label and says it's completely unscientific and no one should pay any attention. But it has something to do with the amount of time he has spent meditating - something like 10,000 hours. He's involved with a society that is studying meditation and the brain to see if the first is making any difference to the second. He is one of the guinea pigs. So the engineers said to him "How long before you are really meditating?" They were trying to figure out how much time would be involved in getting their stats. "Mmmm. Maybe 30 seconds. In deep by 1 minute tops". I was stunned to hear him say that. My problem with meditating is trying to get the brain to stop thinking. Your brain wants to think. All the time. Except when sleeping. So most of my time seems to be spent saying to my brain "are you back thinking again? You are not supposed to think. So. Let's start again and for heaven's sake - pay attention!"
The Dali Lama seems like a happy guy. And Mr. Ricard and the Dali Lama apparently spend a lot of time together. He tells the story about a muddy road with bricks placed to walk over it. How people whined and wailed about it. "We burst out laughing - then managed to hip hop over it in great delight. We travel a lot, and it's just part of the day".
I just Googled Matthieu. He's all over the place!