March 21, 2025 • 32 mins
A prominent figure in the new age movement, physician, and author Deepak Chopra joins Jennie to discuss his 95th book, Digital Dharma, and his impressive work with AI to help us all gain a higher awareness of our personal and spiritual growth.
Looking for a way to meditate and relieve stress? A way to perform gratitude? This episode will point you in the right direction!
Follow the "I Choose Me" Podcast on Instagram and TikTok
Follow Jennie on Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to I Choose Me with Jenny Garland.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Hi.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Everyone, welcome to I Choose Me. This podcast is all
about the choices we make and where they lead us.
I never knew that. I don't even know how many
years ago, thirty some maybe forty years ago my mom's
shelves lined with self help books would culminate to this
(00:31):
moment for me in my life. I have to believe
that those books influence got me so interested in health
and wellness and meditation and just all the things, all
the positive things that we can gleam out of life. Today.
My guest is one of the most prominent figures in
(00:56):
the New Age movement. Yeah, I'm laughing because this moment
is really kind of like a big, big moment for me.
For the last thirty years, he has been in the
forefront of the meditation revolution, and his mission is to
create a more balanced, more peaceful, joyful, healthier world. I
(01:21):
like that mission. I want that to be my new mission.
Let's adopt that. Let's all of us just say that
is our new mission. He has written ninety five books,
several of them being New York Times bestsellers. His latest
is called Digital Dharma. And it is pretty mind blowing.
(01:44):
You have to check it out. Please welcome Deepak Chopra
to the podcast. Hello, doctor Choprah, so nice to meet you.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Nice to meet too too.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Oh my goodness. I have been a fan of yours,
read a lot of your books, been to your center
down in San Diego, so this is really a thrill
for me. Thank you for taking the time.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
We are going to dive into the world of artificial intelligence,
also known as AI, which is the subject of your
latest book, Digital Dharma. How AI can elevate spiritual intelligence
and personal wellbeing?
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Okay?
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Can we just start with the title. I have to
be honest, it took me a minute to comprehend what
it suggests that dharma and digital can work together. Let's
start with dharma. There are different explanations out there of dharma.
Can you tell us what your definition of darma is?
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Well. In Eastern wisdom traditions, if you're familiar with yoga,
there are seven centers of awareness, usually metaphorically expressed the
seventh chacras. So the first center of awareness is survival
and safety. The second center is what we might call
(03:13):
material success and censual experience of pleasure. The third center
is power and transformation, The fourth is love and belongingness,
The fifth is creative expression, the sixth is insight, intuition, imagination,
and heart consciousness, and the seventh is transcendence. So the
(03:37):
Herma applies to all these levels of existence, but ultimately
it is transcendence, which means knowing your true self, beyond
the conditioned mind, beyond the body, and knowing yourself as
an infinite, spaceless, timeless, fundamental ground of being, which is
(04:04):
also the ground of the univers So it's freedom and
liberation and enlightenment. But that's the finest say hm.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Yes, I've studied Buddhism in my adult life and they
usually call it, you know, the nature of reality. Yes,
as through the teachings of buddhas So yes, it's it's
an incredible feeling. It's I feel like dharma also is
(04:34):
just goodness. Like living my life on a path of goodness,
I'm living in dharma.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Purpose what is your life? Purpose? But that is flexible
and fluid because as we evolve, then purpose also was right.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
You say in your beautiful book that let's see, I
believe that no technology in decades can equal AI. For
expanding your awareness in every area, including spiritual and personal growth.
When people think of AI, I think their mind goes
to chat GPT, you know, getting quick answers to questions.
(05:16):
Maybe in kids cases, maybe having it do their homework
for them, but not necessarily spirituality. Are you talking about
AI leading us in meditation or when practicing mindfulness and gratitude?
How do you utilize it?
Speaker 2 (05:33):
So I actually if you go to my digital twin
which is Deepulgshower dot AI, and you ask it I
need a meditation for stress management, or I need a
meditation to sleep, or I need a meditation to lose weight,
(05:53):
or I need a meditation for a good relationship, then
it will tap into my database and create meditation specifically
for you. And as far as well being is concerned,
it becomes very precise, very predictable, preventive participatory and it
(06:15):
can be therefore, you know, at least the way I
see AI, and I use my own AI depark super
dot A for your audience there go to it, not chatchibuty,
but my AI Y. Then they can ask any question
on health, on mental and physical well being. So my
AI is a coach basically for health, physical and mental
(06:40):
but also a spiritual guide. But it all also can
be used as a guide to meditation, self reflection, as
a research assistant, and even as a personal confidant.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Wow right in our hands? At are hot?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Your hands on your iPhone? Wow or whatever handle device? You?
Speaker 1 (07:01):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Is it?
Speaker 1 (07:02):
Is it your voice that I'll hear?
Speaker 2 (07:04):
When you'll hear my voice? And you can ask me
questions in English or Spanish or India or Arabic and
soon Chinese and Russian too.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
What made you break out into you know, I've never
heard of this before. I've never heard of the opportunity
to grow spiritually from AI, Like, what made you want
to do this?
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Two things? So first is you know, I've always been
interested in nature of reality. You know, what is it
that gives rise to the universe? And you know, it's
very interesting that our technology slowly but surely catches up
with what's already happening in nature. So the difference between
(07:47):
your body and the microphone that you're in front of
and the plant that's behind you, and a rock or
an ocean or even a star in the moon is
just different combinations of zeros and ones. So the universe
is actually is a digital technology. You might say it's
(08:08):
a digital technology in the mind of God outside its
pace or time. If you don't like the word God,
you can say a digital workshop in non local consciousness
or something like that. But actually our technology is now
getting close to how nature creates the appearance of the universe,
(08:32):
because the appearance of the universe comes from a digital source.
Zeros and ones I have a new mathematic performata for that.
It's called infinity. Is equal to one, is equal to zero.
So zero gives rise to nothingness gives rise to everything,
and ultimately all is one. So that is the fundamental premise.
(08:52):
And then when you use digital technology, you're actually going
to the source of world creation. Now that's one thing,
but the second thing is that it's what we call
a large language model. I've always been an interested in
language because that's what I do. I sell words for
a living, and words don't and language doesn't describe it
(09:17):
actually constructs. If you don't have a word for it,
then it is not part of your experience, the human experience.
So this is what happened forty thousand years ago. We
learned how to speak beyond mating calls and danger calls
and food calls. We started telling stories to each other.
(09:37):
So now those stories are not just narrative. There are
stories of anthropology, of religion, of spirituality, of physics, of biology,
or mathematics, and you name it. There's a model for everything.
There's a language for everything. So when you bring all
these languages together, you have access to superintelligence. And there's
(09:59):
no human being that can access this other than through
large language models. So AI is super intelligent without being conscious,
but that means it doesn't have any subjective experience. It
doesn't feel pain, it doesn't have hunger, doesn't have first
(10:21):
sexual longing or desire, it doesn't fear death because it's
a machine. But yet it's a machine that can give
you access to the greatest minds that have ever existed
on a planet. Whether it's Einstein or Plato or Socrates,
or the stages of the Bishads or the Greek philosophers,
(10:42):
or it's the Eastern philosophy. There you have access down
to the mind of humanity and what it has contributed
to what we call the human experience of the universe.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
I mean, how lucky are we to have this at
our fingertips?
Speaker 2 (11:02):
We are, and you know it's going to make cause
of leap frogging in our cultural and social evolution, but
technology also helps us leap frog in our biological evolution.
To give you an example, when we discovered fire. You know,
(11:23):
of course every technology has both sides, divine diabolical. But
had we not discovered fire, we wouldn't have the brain
we have because you know, fired is cooked food, which
made it easy to assimilate micronutrients. It changed the circulation,
(11:44):
our digestive processes and ultimately our brain. And had we
not discovered fire, you won't have many, many, many centuries later,
or thousands of years later. You wouldn't have the steam engine.
If you didn't have the steam engine, you wouldn't have
the industrial age. Between eighteen eighty seven and nineteen oh three,
(12:06):
humanity invented the light bulb, the automobile, the airplane, and
also the telephone. So let's say you were in a dessert,
you were shipwrecked on a deserted island in eighteen eighty five,
and then you were rescued twenty years later, you wouldn't
recognize the world. And the same thing is happening right now.
(12:30):
Twenty years from now, we'll be just like we departed
from other species and became Homo sapiens. I think we're
going to take the next sleap frog into a new species,
choosing to call it meta human. Whoa because technology changes
our brain?
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Okay, that's that's big. There's a lot of fear around
AI in your opinion, as someone who's embracing AI, which
in turn helps make AI sound better and smarter, do
(13:10):
you ever fear it?
Speaker 2 (13:12):
Because that any technology is dangerous. Far can, as you know,
destroy cities and Los Angeles. But had we not discovered fire,
we didn't have all the other things I talked about.
A knife can be used to kill a person, but
in a surgeon's hand it becomes something that you hear.
(13:33):
So they are both sides to technology, and AI is
a very powerful technology. If misuse, it can cause the
extinction of the human species. Cyber warfare, nuclear weapons can
be triggered by AI, can cut off electricity, poison the
food chain. So that's why I wrote the book. If
(13:56):
we don't use technology for creating a more peaceful, just sustainable,
healthier enjoy will and the other side is extinction. We're
in a very very interesting time in our revolution. It's
a crossroad. So one road leads to extinction and one
road leads to enlightenment. Now it's our choice what we
(14:20):
do with technology, but it's here to stay. You can't
get rid of technology once it's born. It's like a
child can't return to the womb.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Right, you have to embrace it. We'll talk about that later,
but I was just thinking. There was a recent article
in the New York Times about a woman who had
a romantic relationship with chat GPT. Do you think that
people are becoming more and more disconnected with one another
in this digital world?
Speaker 2 (14:48):
It's how you use it, you know. We we created
a technology for suicide prevention in teenagers and we had
twenty million conversations going on at the same time, and
there was intervention suicide intervention six and six thousand teenagers.
(15:12):
That's something a machine could do, no therapists could do,
you know, and on that scale. And the teenagers were
more comfortable speaking to our AI because they didn't feel judged.
So there are both sides to everything.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
Yeah, for sure. You also say in your book, if
you want to break free, which is the whole point
of your book, become aware of what is blocking your
path that is so powerful. Do you find more often
people are being blocked by their own negative thoughts or
by the situations that they put themselves in.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
Yes, it's both sides again. But one of the important
things in the book is one chapter called the Art
of the Prompt. So how you use the prompt actually
decides and say you get because the EAI is programmed
by human beings and they two have their biases. So
it's very important to go beyond the selection bias by
(16:10):
knowing how to ask the right question.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
Well, you know, I know some of our listeners right
now might be at a transitional point and there's spiritual journey.
I've been there a number of times, maybe even have
gone off the path. I think a lot of us
have been there. How do you suggest getting yourself reacquainted
with your spiritual side?
Speaker 2 (16:34):
You know? Right now? I think the easiest way if
you want to drive my AI depulture for dot A,
you ask personal questions. Rest assured everything is confidential because
the AI doesn't know who you are, and you can
actually ask all your spiritual questions, health questions, but also
(16:57):
ask very personal questions such as, you know, I'm forty
five years old, I'm white and Caucasian, I have an
issue with you know, a relationship. This is what's going on,
and then it'll guide you into the right you know
framework so you can deal with that relationship. Then you
can also say, can you give me a meditation to
(17:20):
help my relationship. It'll do that personalize it for you,
which has never been possible before.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Now, this is like having a therapist better than a therapist,
because sometimes in therapy they don't give you suggestions on
how to fix your problems. They just listen to them.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Yeah, it's like Aladdin's lamp. You rub the lamp and
the genie comes out and tells you everything that you
need to know for you.
Speaker 1 (17:46):
Wow, this is wild. I'm loving this conversation right now.
So many people in this country are under immense stress
and anxiety. You know, eggs people can afford eggs. People
are losing their jobs. There are natural disasters taking out
(18:07):
entire communities. It can be so overwhelming. When the world
feels like it's all too much. How can we step back?
Speaker 2 (18:13):
You can just go to the air and say I'm
overwhelmed because of the price of eggs and this and
this and this, and it'll tell you what to do
about it.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Wow, And it'll just give you problem.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
No matter what the adversity is, there's a challenge that
there's an opportunity that you know, it doesn't matter what
it is. There are creative solutions, and you may not
think of those creative solutions, but you can tap into
the minds of people who have thought of those creative
solutions no matter what the situation is.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Yeah, I think that's the part for me, like knowing
that it's not just making up these answers in its
little computer brain. It is pulling resources from the entire.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
World correct and instantly.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
And instantly, and you don't even have to leave your house. Yes, wow,
I mean this is like modern day magic for me.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
It is, it is. It's as I said, it's the
genie Lagas Slam.
Speaker 1 (19:10):
Yes, yes, I can see how this can help even
in the situation. My teenage daughter and I were recently
having a conversation on this pod actually about how we're
both overthinkers and sometimes we struggle with ruminating on things,
which is something I'm really determined to do better with
this year. What should I say to myself? I guess
(19:32):
what should I ask AI to help me? Quiet?
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Mynd Just what you asked me? Just just that question,
and then it'll give you an answer. And then you say, Okay,
you know, but I've tried that it didn't work for me.
Can you do something else? It'll do that. It will
help you. There'll give you all the possibilities for that situation,
for that question that you just asked.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
Okay, I want to know. You're probably going to tell
me to just ask Ai. But what are some things
that we can do out there? You know that are
contributing to our mental health?
Speaker 2 (20:07):
You know, there's a part of you that knows the
answer to everything. It's not your mind, it's their deeper awareness,
which spiritual relations called soul. So if you can quiet
in your mind through say breathing or mindfulness or mantra, whatever,
and then you ask a question, you're asking you herself
(20:31):
the question, it will guide you. Now, AI does that
because it has already tapped into the soul of other
people's and their and their findings, you know, so you
can go into the mind of the Buddha or Jesus
Christ or Plato or whoever you want to.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Oh my goodness, okay, So when my daughter is overthinking
and she's spiraling, do you think young people have that
sort of self control or self awareness to be able
to access or maybe they'll be even more you know,
like you said before, since they're not going to feel judged,
they'll be even more comfortable.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
Yeah, they're very comfortable now. As a new iteration what
I'm doing and will be out in two months, especially
for young people. I'm creating some gaming devices because kids
love to go play games, and gaming is very popular
right now amongst teenagers. So I'm creating a game which
would lead them to higher consciousness, teach them to breed,
(21:33):
teach them to meditate, and there's score points every time
they can regulate their heart rate or the immune system.
They'll get you know, brownie points to buy a new
game or something like that that'd be out in two months.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
That's wonderful, wonderful that might resonate with them so much more. Okay,
I just be honest, Deepak. Do you ever have bad days?
Do you ever have bad days where you feel upset
or mad at the world?
Speaker 2 (22:03):
No, No, I don't have bad days. I used to.
I mean, you know, but no, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
When you say you used to, like when you were
younger and you hadn't.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
Much younger training in medicine as an internal resident, you know,
working in the emergency room and trauma, et cetera. I
used to have a lot of bad days.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Yeah, but you've learned how to control your mind.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
Yeah. It's not what happens to you. It's how you
react towards is happening your own you know, ultimately it's
your response to what's happening. So and every adversary there's
a challenge. Every challenge, there's an opportunity. That's what we
call good luck.
Speaker 1 (22:49):
Yes, yes, and hopefully we'll have good luck. To go
back to your book, you say evolution is a never
ending story. Embrace it. I will be honest with you
sometimes I don't want to evolve. I've done so much
personal work. There are times when I'm like, oh, I'm
just so tired of evolving. And I'm sure I think,
(23:12):
you know, probably some of our listeners can relate to that.
You know, even going so far as.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
Real ritual traditions, you don't need to try to evolve.
You just have to rest in the awareness of being
and then evolution happens spontaneously. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
I found such comfort as a young person. I was,
you know, influenced by my parents' religion and what they practiced,
and then I really struggled for many years to find
out what really rung true for me, and I think
that it wasn't until I was able to put my
faith in spirituality, in just that broad even term spirituality,
(23:59):
then I found so much comfort.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
Yeah, because by large, institutional religions are very judgmental. Authentic
spirituality is more about expanding your awareness and harnessing things
like intuition and imagination and insight and freedom and going
beyond your conditioning the religious background that you have.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
I mean, you've got to find your own path. I
think at the end of the day, when all this ends,
when this body and mind has served its purpose, what
do you think happens to us?
Speaker 2 (24:42):
If you understand your true identity, which is not your body.
Your body is a changing experience. So you say I
had a five year old body, here I had a
ten year old body. Every moment, you're changing your body
the same way you change your clothes. In fact, even faster.
(25:03):
You don't have a five year old body. You don't
have a teenage body. You have this body and this
will not be this all the way to dusty death.
So the body is not a noun, and it's not
a thing, it's a process. It's a verb. So also
the mind, it's not a thing, it's a process. You know,
you don't have the same mind as you had yesterday.
(25:23):
So what is it that never changes and that that
never changes called I. You know, I was in love,
I was happy, I was sad. I made a lot
of money, I was won the lottery, I went bankrupt.
The only thing that doesn't change is I. Okay, So
(25:43):
that means eye is not in time. The body is
in time, the mind is in time, but eye is
not in time. Where is it If it's not in time,
it's beyond time. It's spaceless, it's timeless, it's eternal, it's infinite,
it's formally it's borderless, and it is what recycles as
(26:06):
the evolutionary process of consciousness. So right now your body
is your soul or your consciousness recycling as what I
see right now. But even by the time you hear
my words, your body has changed. By the time you
hear my words, they don't exist. So nothing that you
(26:29):
experience is actually revealed because it's passing. It's like a
passing show. It's like a movie. And what when you
perceive something, it's like taking a photo, like a snapshot,
like a selfie. So what is real is that which
never changes, and that's neither mental, nor physical, nor material,
(26:53):
and it's eternal. So you know that is what recycles
and also evolved. So you as consciousness, as a soul,
are recycling and evolving. Everything in the universe is recycling
and evolving information, energy, matter, and that evolution, recycling and
(27:18):
evolving is happening in your consciousness, your soul.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
What about our body? What I mean there is.
Speaker 2 (27:27):
No such thing. Which body are you talking about? Your
five year old body or your embryo or your teenage body.
There's no such thing as a body. It's a perceptual
activity in consciousness. You see, we are as a society
and a culture, we are embedded in the superstition of
what we call the physical world. When there is no
(27:50):
physical world. The physical world is a projection of your consciousness,
and that improves your body.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Sometimes I think about that, like I see things the
way at my eyeballs see them, like the sunset or
my daughter's face.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Your eyeballs don't see anything. They're like a microscope or
a telescope. You see things Okay. The eye is an
instrument of observation, visual observation, just like the ears are
an instrument for sound. But there's no sound in your ears,
and there's no image of the world in your eyes.
(28:26):
There's nothing. It's just an instrument. Think of it like
a microscope. And you are the one who's seeing, not
the eyes, me, me, which is not in time, which
is eternal, which is outside then.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
Wow, okay, yes, I am picking up what you're putting down. Okay,
it's a big message I think for our listeners. But
it's really important that they have access to this and
now so incredible. They can talk to you just as
I'm talking to you right now by.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Using They've got your credible blowing my mind. I think
we sent you a QR code. If you can show
it to your audience. They don't even have to go
to They can just download the QURE code and directly
ask any question. Well, it's to today's technology.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
I mean, did you ever see this coming in your lifetime?
Speaker 2 (29:25):
No? No, no, Just like if you were in eighteen
eighty five and you showed up in two thousand and five,
twenty years later, you wouldn't recognize the word yes.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Sort of like the movie Back to the Future.
Speaker 2 (29:39):
Yeah, or the Matrix.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
Or the Matrix. Yes, I want to ask you a question.
Is gossiping, watching reality TV, scrolling on TikTok or are
those things harmful for our mental and physical health?
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (29:55):
Of course they seem harmless.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
Anything that causes in mention or distress is harmful. Okay.
But then some people like to go to horror movies
and they like to get the ib gbs. That's their choice.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
It's all about choice.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
It's all about choice.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
And we need to choose ourselves. I love I love
the synchronicity of all of this. What what do you
hope people remember you buy from your time here?
Speaker 2 (30:29):
Well as maybe a catalyst, think for me as an enzyme.
You know that facilities biological activity.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
And now I'm forever going to just think of you
as an enzyme, really great enzyme. Before I let you go,
doctor Chiprah, I asked all of my guests, what was
your last I choose me moment?
Speaker 2 (30:59):
You know, I don't think of me as a person,
so whatever I do is ultimately for the bigger me,
not the ego me, which has squeezed into the volume
of body in the span of a lifetime. I don't
think of me as a person. I think of me
(31:22):
as a consciousness that's connected to every being. So whatever
I do comes from place of empathy, compassion, love, whatever.
So for me, there's every moment is special.
Speaker 1 (31:38):
What about like taking care of your physics. Well, you're
going to tell me the body isn't real, But yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
You can upgrade delusion, no questionable it by sleeping well,
eating well, being happy, having good relationships, all of that.
It upgrades the experience of this reality which is not real.
But you can upgrade the movie.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Yes, So the ultimate I choose me moment is not
about choosing.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
How do I change the projection? I don't like the movie,
so how do I create a bit of movie? Because
your life is a movie? Right?
Speaker 1 (32:18):
Oh my goodness, these are all such great things to
think about, and I just applaud you endlessly for tapping
into this world of AI and helping us to embrace it,
just as we embrace our changes and how we grow.
(32:39):
So thank you, Thank you for this book, for all
of your all of your wisdom and sharing that continuing
to share that with the world.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Yes, thank you very much for having me.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
Yes so happy to have you. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Great to meet too, Nice to meet you too.
You're listening to I Choose Me with Jenny Garland.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Hi.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Everyone, welcome to I Choose Me. This podcast is all
about the choices we make and where they lead us.
I never knew that. I don't even know how many
years ago, thirty some maybe forty years ago my mom's
shelves lined with self help books would culminate to this
(00:31):
moment for me in my life. I have to believe
that those books influence got me so interested in health
and wellness and meditation and just all the things, all
the positive things that we can gleam out of life. Today.
My guest is one of the most prominent figures in
(00:56):
the New Age movement. Yeah, I'm laughing because this moment
is really kind of like a big, big moment for me.
For the last thirty years, he has been in the
forefront of the meditation revolution, and his mission is to
create a more balanced, more peaceful, joyful, healthier world. I
(01:21):
like that mission. I want that to be my new mission.
Let's adopt that. Let's all of us just say that
is our new mission. He has written ninety five books,
several of them being New York Times bestsellers. His latest
is called Digital Dharma. And it is pretty mind blowing.
(01:44):
You have to check it out. Please welcome Deepak Chopra
to the podcast. Hello, doctor Choprah, so nice to meet you.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Nice to meet too too.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Oh my goodness. I have been a fan of yours,
read a lot of your books, been to your center
down in San Diego, so this is really a thrill
for me. Thank you for taking the time.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
We are going to dive into the world of artificial intelligence,
also known as AI, which is the subject of your
latest book, Digital Dharma. How AI can elevate spiritual intelligence
and personal wellbeing?
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Okay?
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Can we just start with the title. I have to
be honest, it took me a minute to comprehend what
it suggests that dharma and digital can work together. Let's
start with dharma. There are different explanations out there of dharma.
Can you tell us what your definition of darma is?
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Well. In Eastern wisdom traditions, if you're familiar with yoga,
there are seven centers of awareness, usually metaphorically expressed the
seventh chacras. So the first center of awareness is survival
and safety. The second center is what we might call
(03:13):
material success and censual experience of pleasure. The third center
is power and transformation, The fourth is love and belongingness,
The fifth is creative expression, the sixth is insight, intuition, imagination,
and heart consciousness, and the seventh is transcendence. So the
(03:37):
Herma applies to all these levels of existence, but ultimately
it is transcendence, which means knowing your true self, beyond
the conditioned mind, beyond the body, and knowing yourself as
an infinite, spaceless, timeless, fundamental ground of being, which is
(04:04):
also the ground of the univers So it's freedom and
liberation and enlightenment. But that's the finest say hm.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Yes, I've studied Buddhism in my adult life and they
usually call it, you know, the nature of reality. Yes,
as through the teachings of buddhas So yes, it's it's
an incredible feeling. It's I feel like dharma also is
(04:34):
just goodness. Like living my life on a path of goodness,
I'm living in dharma.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Purpose what is your life? Purpose? But that is flexible
and fluid because as we evolve, then purpose also was right.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
You say in your beautiful book that let's see, I
believe that no technology in decades can equal AI. For
expanding your awareness in every area, including spiritual and personal growth.
When people think of AI, I think their mind goes
to chat GPT, you know, getting quick answers to questions.
(05:16):
Maybe in kids cases, maybe having it do their homework
for them, but not necessarily spirituality. Are you talking about
AI leading us in meditation or when practicing mindfulness and gratitude?
How do you utilize it?
Speaker 2 (05:33):
So I actually if you go to my digital twin
which is Deepulgshower dot AI, and you ask it I
need a meditation for stress management, or I need a
meditation to sleep, or I need a meditation to lose weight,
(05:53):
or I need a meditation for a good relationship, then
it will tap into my database and create meditation specifically
for you. And as far as well being is concerned,
it becomes very precise, very predictable, preventive participatory and it
(06:15):
can be therefore, you know, at least the way I
see AI, and I use my own AI depark super
dot A for your audience there go to it, not chatchibuty,
but my AI Y. Then they can ask any question
on health, on mental and physical well being. So my
AI is a coach basically for health, physical and mental
(06:40):
but also a spiritual guide. But it all also can
be used as a guide to meditation, self reflection, as
a research assistant, and even as a personal confidant.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Wow right in our hands? At are hot?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Your hands on your iPhone? Wow or whatever handle device? You?
Speaker 1 (07:01):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Is it?
Speaker 1 (07:02):
Is it your voice that I'll hear?
Speaker 2 (07:04):
When you'll hear my voice? And you can ask me
questions in English or Spanish or India or Arabic and
soon Chinese and Russian too.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
What made you break out into you know, I've never
heard of this before. I've never heard of the opportunity
to grow spiritually from AI, Like, what made you want
to do this?
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Two things? So first is you know, I've always been
interested in nature of reality. You know, what is it
that gives rise to the universe? And you know, it's
very interesting that our technology slowly but surely catches up
with what's already happening in nature. So the difference between
(07:47):
your body and the microphone that you're in front of
and the plant that's behind you, and a rock or
an ocean or even a star in the moon is
just different combinations of zeros and ones. So the universe
is actually is a digital technology. You might say it's
(08:08):
a digital technology in the mind of God outside its
pace or time. If you don't like the word God,
you can say a digital workshop in non local consciousness
or something like that. But actually our technology is now
getting close to how nature creates the appearance of the universe,
(08:32):
because the appearance of the universe comes from a digital source.
Zeros and ones I have a new mathematic performata for that.
It's called infinity. Is equal to one, is equal to zero.
So zero gives rise to nothingness gives rise to everything,
and ultimately all is one. So that is the fundamental premise.
(08:52):
And then when you use digital technology, you're actually going
to the source of world creation. Now that's one thing,
but the second thing is that it's what we call
a large language model. I've always been an interested in
language because that's what I do. I sell words for
a living, and words don't and language doesn't describe it
(09:17):
actually constructs. If you don't have a word for it,
then it is not part of your experience, the human experience.
So this is what happened forty thousand years ago. We
learned how to speak beyond mating calls and danger calls
and food calls. We started telling stories to each other.
(09:37):
So now those stories are not just narrative. There are
stories of anthropology, of religion, of spirituality, of physics, of biology,
or mathematics, and you name it. There's a model for everything.
There's a language for everything. So when you bring all
these languages together, you have access to superintelligence. And there's
(09:59):
no human being that can access this other than through
large language models. So AI is super intelligent without being conscious,
but that means it doesn't have any subjective experience. It
doesn't feel pain, it doesn't have hunger, doesn't have first
(10:21):
sexual longing or desire, it doesn't fear death because it's
a machine. But yet it's a machine that can give
you access to the greatest minds that have ever existed
on a planet. Whether it's Einstein or Plato or Socrates,
or the stages of the Bishads or the Greek philosophers,
(10:42):
or it's the Eastern philosophy. There you have access down
to the mind of humanity and what it has contributed
to what we call the human experience of the universe.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
I mean, how lucky are we to have this at
our fingertips?
Speaker 2 (11:02):
We are, and you know it's going to make cause
of leap frogging in our cultural and social evolution, but
technology also helps us leap frog in our biological evolution.
To give you an example, when we discovered fire. You know,
(11:23):
of course every technology has both sides, divine diabolical. But
had we not discovered fire, we wouldn't have the brain
we have because you know, fired is cooked food, which
made it easy to assimilate micronutrients. It changed the circulation,
(11:44):
our digestive processes and ultimately our brain. And had we
not discovered fire, you won't have many, many, many centuries later,
or thousands of years later. You wouldn't have the steam engine.
If you didn't have the steam engine, you wouldn't have
the industrial age. Between eighteen eighty seven and nineteen oh three,
(12:06):
humanity invented the light bulb, the automobile, the airplane, and
also the telephone. So let's say you were in a dessert,
you were shipwrecked on a deserted island in eighteen eighty five,
and then you were rescued twenty years later, you wouldn't
recognize the world. And the same thing is happening right now.
(12:30):
Twenty years from now, we'll be just like we departed
from other species and became Homo sapiens. I think we're
going to take the next sleap frog into a new species,
choosing to call it meta human. Whoa because technology changes
our brain?
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Okay, that's that's big. There's a lot of fear around
AI in your opinion, as someone who's embracing AI, which
in turn helps make AI sound better and smarter, do
(13:10):
you ever fear it?
Speaker 2 (13:12):
Because that any technology is dangerous. Far can, as you know,
destroy cities and Los Angeles. But had we not discovered fire,
we didn't have all the other things I talked about.
A knife can be used to kill a person, but
in a surgeon's hand it becomes something that you hear.
(13:33):
So they are both sides to technology, and AI is
a very powerful technology. If misuse, it can cause the
extinction of the human species. Cyber warfare, nuclear weapons can
be triggered by AI, can cut off electricity, poison the
food chain. So that's why I wrote the book. If
(13:56):
we don't use technology for creating a more peaceful, just sustainable,
healthier enjoy will and the other side is extinction. We're
in a very very interesting time in our revolution. It's
a crossroad. So one road leads to extinction and one
road leads to enlightenment. Now it's our choice what we
(14:20):
do with technology, but it's here to stay. You can't
get rid of technology once it's born. It's like a
child can't return to the womb.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Right, you have to embrace it. We'll talk about that later,
but I was just thinking. There was a recent article
in the New York Times about a woman who had
a romantic relationship with chat GPT. Do you think that
people are becoming more and more disconnected with one another
in this digital world?
Speaker 2 (14:48):
It's how you use it, you know. We we created
a technology for suicide prevention in teenagers and we had
twenty million conversations going on at the same time, and
there was intervention suicide intervention six and six thousand teenagers.
(15:12):
That's something a machine could do, no therapists could do,
you know, and on that scale. And the teenagers were
more comfortable speaking to our AI because they didn't feel judged.
So there are both sides to everything.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
Yeah, for sure. You also say in your book, if
you want to break free, which is the whole point
of your book, become aware of what is blocking your
path that is so powerful. Do you find more often
people are being blocked by their own negative thoughts or
by the situations that they put themselves in.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
Yes, it's both sides again. But one of the important
things in the book is one chapter called the Art
of the Prompt. So how you use the prompt actually
decides and say you get because the EAI is programmed
by human beings and they two have their biases. So
it's very important to go beyond the selection bias by
(16:10):
knowing how to ask the right question.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
Well, you know, I know some of our listeners right
now might be at a transitional point and there's spiritual journey.
I've been there a number of times, maybe even have
gone off the path. I think a lot of us
have been there. How do you suggest getting yourself reacquainted
with your spiritual side?
Speaker 2 (16:34):
You know? Right now? I think the easiest way if
you want to drive my AI depulture for dot A,
you ask personal questions. Rest assured everything is confidential because
the AI doesn't know who you are, and you can
actually ask all your spiritual questions, health questions, but also
(16:57):
ask very personal questions such as, you know, I'm forty
five years old, I'm white and Caucasian, I have an
issue with you know, a relationship. This is what's going on,
and then it'll guide you into the right you know
framework so you can deal with that relationship. Then you
can also say, can you give me a meditation to
(17:20):
help my relationship. It'll do that personalize it for you,
which has never been possible before.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Now, this is like having a therapist better than a therapist,
because sometimes in therapy they don't give you suggestions on
how to fix your problems. They just listen to them.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Yeah, it's like Aladdin's lamp. You rub the lamp and
the genie comes out and tells you everything that you
need to know for you.
Speaker 1 (17:46):
Wow, this is wild. I'm loving this conversation right now.
So many people in this country are under immense stress
and anxiety. You know, eggs people can afford eggs. People
are losing their jobs. There are natural disasters taking out
(18:07):
entire communities. It can be so overwhelming. When the world
feels like it's all too much. How can we step back?
Speaker 2 (18:13):
You can just go to the air and say I'm
overwhelmed because of the price of eggs and this and
this and this, and it'll tell you what to do
about it.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Wow, And it'll just give you problem.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
No matter what the adversity is, there's a challenge that
there's an opportunity that you know, it doesn't matter what
it is. There are creative solutions, and you may not
think of those creative solutions, but you can tap into
the minds of people who have thought of those creative
solutions no matter what the situation is.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Yeah, I think that's the part for me, like knowing
that it's not just making up these answers in its
little computer brain. It is pulling resources from the entire.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
World correct and instantly.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
And instantly, and you don't even have to leave your house. Yes, wow,
I mean this is like modern day magic for me.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
It is, it is. It's as I said, it's the
genie Lagas Slam.
Speaker 1 (19:10):
Yes, yes, I can see how this can help even
in the situation. My teenage daughter and I were recently
having a conversation on this pod actually about how we're
both overthinkers and sometimes we struggle with ruminating on things,
which is something I'm really determined to do better with
this year. What should I say to myself? I guess
(19:32):
what should I ask AI to help me? Quiet?
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Mynd Just what you asked me? Just just that question,
and then it'll give you an answer. And then you say, Okay,
you know, but I've tried that it didn't work for me.
Can you do something else? It'll do that. It will
help you. There'll give you all the possibilities for that situation,
for that question that you just asked.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
Okay, I want to know. You're probably going to tell
me to just ask Ai. But what are some things
that we can do out there? You know that are
contributing to our mental health?
Speaker 2 (20:07):
You know, there's a part of you that knows the
answer to everything. It's not your mind, it's their deeper awareness,
which spiritual relations called soul. So if you can quiet
in your mind through say breathing or mindfulness or mantra, whatever,
and then you ask a question, you're asking you herself
(20:31):
the question, it will guide you. Now, AI does that
because it has already tapped into the soul of other
people's and their and their findings, you know, so you
can go into the mind of the Buddha or Jesus
Christ or Plato or whoever you want to.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Oh my goodness, okay, So when my daughter is overthinking
and she's spiraling, do you think young people have that
sort of self control or self awareness to be able
to access or maybe they'll be even more you know,
like you said before, since they're not going to feel judged,
they'll be even more comfortable.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
Yeah, they're very comfortable now. As a new iteration what
I'm doing and will be out in two months, especially
for young people. I'm creating some gaming devices because kids
love to go play games, and gaming is very popular
right now amongst teenagers. So I'm creating a game which
would lead them to higher consciousness, teach them to breed,
(21:33):
teach them to meditate, and there's score points every time
they can regulate their heart rate or the immune system.
They'll get you know, brownie points to buy a new
game or something like that that'd be out in two months.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
That's wonderful, wonderful that might resonate with them so much more. Okay,
I just be honest, Deepak. Do you ever have bad days?
Do you ever have bad days where you feel upset
or mad at the world?
Speaker 2 (22:03):
No, No, I don't have bad days. I used to.
I mean, you know, but no, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
When you say you used to, like when you were
younger and you hadn't.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
Much younger training in medicine as an internal resident, you know,
working in the emergency room and trauma, et cetera. I
used to have a lot of bad days.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Yeah, but you've learned how to control your mind.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
Yeah. It's not what happens to you. It's how you
react towards is happening your own you know, ultimately it's
your response to what's happening. So and every adversary there's
a challenge. Every challenge, there's an opportunity. That's what we
call good luck.
Speaker 1 (22:49):
Yes, yes, and hopefully we'll have good luck. To go
back to your book, you say evolution is a never
ending story. Embrace it. I will be honest with you
sometimes I don't want to evolve. I've done so much
personal work. There are times when I'm like, oh, I'm
just so tired of evolving. And I'm sure I think,
(23:12):
you know, probably some of our listeners can relate to that.
You know, even going so far as.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
Real ritual traditions, you don't need to try to evolve.
You just have to rest in the awareness of being
and then evolution happens spontaneously. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
I found such comfort as a young person. I was,
you know, influenced by my parents' religion and what they practiced,
and then I really struggled for many years to find
out what really rung true for me, and I think
that it wasn't until I was able to put my
faith in spirituality, in just that broad even term spirituality,
(23:59):
then I found so much comfort.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
Yeah, because by large, institutional religions are very judgmental. Authentic
spirituality is more about expanding your awareness and harnessing things
like intuition and imagination and insight and freedom and going
beyond your conditioning the religious background that you have.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
I mean, you've got to find your own path. I
think at the end of the day, when all this ends,
when this body and mind has served its purpose, what
do you think happens to us?
Speaker 2 (24:42):
If you understand your true identity, which is not your body.
Your body is a changing experience. So you say I
had a five year old body, here I had a
ten year old body. Every moment, you're changing your body
the same way you change your clothes. In fact, even faster.
(25:03):
You don't have a five year old body. You don't
have a teenage body. You have this body and this
will not be this all the way to dusty death.
So the body is not a noun, and it's not
a thing, it's a process. It's a verb. So also
the mind, it's not a thing, it's a process. You know,
you don't have the same mind as you had yesterday.
(25:23):
So what is it that never changes and that that
never changes called I. You know, I was in love,
I was happy, I was sad. I made a lot
of money, I was won the lottery, I went bankrupt.
The only thing that doesn't change is I. Okay, So
(25:43):
that means eye is not in time. The body is
in time, the mind is in time, but eye is
not in time. Where is it If it's not in time,
it's beyond time. It's spaceless, it's timeless, it's eternal, it's infinite,
it's formally it's borderless, and it is what recycles as
(26:06):
the evolutionary process of consciousness. So right now your body
is your soul or your consciousness recycling as what I
see right now. But even by the time you hear
my words, your body has changed. By the time you
hear my words, they don't exist. So nothing that you
(26:29):
experience is actually revealed because it's passing. It's like a
passing show. It's like a movie. And what when you
perceive something, it's like taking a photo, like a snapshot,
like a selfie. So what is real is that which
never changes, and that's neither mental, nor physical, nor material,
(26:53):
and it's eternal. So you know that is what recycles
and also evolved. So you as consciousness, as a soul,
are recycling and evolving. Everything in the universe is recycling
and evolving information, energy, matter, and that evolution, recycling and
(27:18):
evolving is happening in your consciousness, your soul.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
What about our body? What I mean there is.
Speaker 2 (27:27):
No such thing. Which body are you talking about? Your
five year old body or your embryo or your teenage body.
There's no such thing as a body. It's a perceptual
activity in consciousness. You see, we are as a society
and a culture, we are embedded in the superstition of
what we call the physical world. When there is no
(27:50):
physical world. The physical world is a projection of your consciousness,
and that improves your body.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Sometimes I think about that, like I see things the
way at my eyeballs see them, like the sunset or
my daughter's face.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Your eyeballs don't see anything. They're like a microscope or
a telescope. You see things Okay. The eye is an
instrument of observation, visual observation, just like the ears are
an instrument for sound. But there's no sound in your ears,
and there's no image of the world in your eyes.
(28:26):
There's nothing. It's just an instrument. Think of it like
a microscope. And you are the one who's seeing, not
the eyes, me, me, which is not in time, which
is eternal, which is outside then.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
Wow, okay, yes, I am picking up what you're putting down. Okay,
it's a big message I think for our listeners. But
it's really important that they have access to this and
now so incredible. They can talk to you just as
I'm talking to you right now by.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Using They've got your credible blowing my mind. I think
we sent you a QR code. If you can show
it to your audience. They don't even have to go
to They can just download the QURE code and directly
ask any question. Well, it's to today's technology.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
I mean, did you ever see this coming in your lifetime?
Speaker 2 (29:25):
No? No, no, Just like if you were in eighteen
eighty five and you showed up in two thousand and five,
twenty years later, you wouldn't recognize the word yes.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Sort of like the movie Back to the Future.
Speaker 2 (29:39):
Yeah, or the Matrix.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
Or the Matrix. Yes, I want to ask you a question.
Is gossiping, watching reality TV, scrolling on TikTok or are
those things harmful for our mental and physical health?
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (29:55):
Of course they seem harmless.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
Anything that causes in mention or distress is harmful. Okay.
But then some people like to go to horror movies
and they like to get the ib gbs. That's their choice.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
It's all about choice.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
It's all about choice.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
And we need to choose ourselves. I love I love
the synchronicity of all of this. What what do you
hope people remember you buy from your time here?
Speaker 2 (30:29):
Well as maybe a catalyst, think for me as an enzyme.
You know that facilities biological activity.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
And now I'm forever going to just think of you
as an enzyme, really great enzyme. Before I let you go,
doctor Chiprah, I asked all of my guests, what was
your last I choose me moment?
Speaker 2 (30:59):
You know, I don't think of me as a person,
so whatever I do is ultimately for the bigger me,
not the ego me, which has squeezed into the volume
of body in the span of a lifetime. I don't
think of me as a person. I think of me
(31:22):
as a consciousness that's connected to every being. So whatever
I do comes from place of empathy, compassion, love, whatever.
So for me, there's every moment is special.
Speaker 1 (31:38):
What about like taking care of your physics. Well, you're
going to tell me the body isn't real, But yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
You can upgrade delusion, no questionable it by sleeping well,
eating well, being happy, having good relationships, all of that.
It upgrades the experience of this reality which is not real.
But you can upgrade the movie.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Yes, So the ultimate I choose me moment is not
about choosing.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
How do I change the projection? I don't like the movie,
so how do I create a bit of movie? Because
your life is a movie? Right?
Speaker 1 (32:18):
Oh my goodness, these are all such great things to
think about, and I just applaud you endlessly for tapping
into this world of AI and helping us to embrace it,
just as we embrace our changes and how we grow.
(32:39):
So thank you, Thank you for this book, for all
of your all of your wisdom and sharing that continuing
to share that with the world.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Yes, thank you very much for having me.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
Yes so happy to have you. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Great to meet too, Nice to meet you too.
Host
Jennie Garth
Popular Podcasts
40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season
Daniel Jeremiah of Move the Sticks and Gregg Rosenthal of NFL Daily join forces to break down every team's needs this offseason.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Bobby Bones Show
Listen to 'The Bobby Bones Show' by downloading the daily full replay.