Deepak Chupacabra

A long time ago, at a coffee shop far, far away, I had a friend who liked to make stickers. He would cut and paste images by hand, then take them to the copy shop to make zine style black and white stickers. They got slapped on lamp posts or carefully hidden in the corner of a store window. You’d see them on the back of street signs. The stickers were funny, subversive takes on popular culture. They were smart, absurdist critiques that left a lot open to interpretation.

One morning, I rolled up to our regular coffeeshop, and as I ordered, I saw a sticker thumbtacked to the bulletin board. It was a xeroed picture of Deepak Chopra with fangs. Under it, the text, “Deepak Chupacabra.”

I asked my friend if he made it. He shrugged and smiled, “I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Plausible deniability.

For those of you who don’t know, the Chupacabra (Goat Sucker) was a phenomenon in the 90s. A cryptid monster conspiracy theory. Goats were turning up in Mexico, drained of blood, with vampiric puncture wounds on their necks. What kind of monster was doing this? Was it an alien? An alien experiment? A government experiment? Some kind of Scooby-Doo style hoax? To this day, I have no idea. But given what’s been going on in the world, it seems like horribly ironic foreshadowing.

In those days, Deepak was just rising to popularity. He had just started showing up on Oprah (no surprise there), writing kitschy books, and making appearances at events called “The Conscious Living Expo.”

He never interested me. He seemed like he was for squares (no offense, squares). I was reading McKenna, Michael Harner, Barbara Ann Brennan, and Iyengar. I was pondering the Bodhisattva’s Vow, which I discovered in Alex Grey’s book Sacred Mirrors.

I wish I could tell you I felt dark energy coming off him, as many people claim these days. I don’t think I was interested enough to give him an energy reading. I was used to not liking popular stuff.

I’ve always been generally of the opinion that things are not what they seem, that there is darkness plaguing the land, and there were messed-up people doing messed-up things. But it was just a vague sense. And when it’s vague, you might question it. Our entire culture is set up to gaslight people who notice that something is off. Anyway…

It wasn’t until later, when I became more deeply involved in the yoga scene, that I started hearing people complain about him. He was rude to the organizers of the book signing. He drank a little too much at a dinner somewhere. Little things like that. But the general consensus was that he was kind of a dick.

But there is a big difference between being kind of a dick sometimes and being a monster. Geez, I’m kind of a dick sometimes. Many of my favorite people are. As the saying goes, “We’re all here because we’re not all there.” We all fall short of the glory of God. I’ve ceased looking for perfection in others, and I’ve ceased looking for perfection in myself.

But this is beyond the freaking pale. I am thoroughly unamused. I’m more livid about Deepak than the rock stars and the actors. Maybe it’s because I expect them to be degenerates (although the ones I’ve met personally were generally decent people). Or maybe because we’re in the same ‘industry.’ Maybe it’s because people are using his involvement as evidence that holistic healing arts as a whole are corrupt.

Maybe it’s because he’s my closest link to Epstein. I’ve been to events at his spa in NYC. I know a bunch of people who trained with him. I’m just two degrees away. Yup, my head went to the ‘six degrees of Kevin Bacon’ game. I’m two degrees from Epstein, and I don’t like it. How many degrees away are you?

I haven’t been this close (knowingly) to a monster since I hung out at Yogi Bhajan’s spot in New Mexico and listened to him tell weird stories about how he manipulated people for the greater good. He needed money to build his center after all. It all worked out because he was the lord of time and space after all. It didn’t sit well with me. I tried to talk to people about how off it was, but I just got blank stares. There was a lot of culty group think going on there. And he was mean to people to. He yelled at the sound guy and talked shit about other religious leaders from the stage. It was bizarre. The energy there was off, but it didn’t cross my mind that actual rampant child abuse was going on. They don’t share that kind of thing with travelling hippies who show up to do work trade for a week.

I tried to watch the documentary series about him, “Holy Hell,” but I couldn’t get through it, it was too disturbing. Maybe I owe it to us all to give it another go. But those are my people. If it happened to one of us, it could happen to any of us. It’s happening to all of us. Monsters prey upon people who are open, honest, vulnerable, and seeking.

And to be honest, it wouldn’t shock me if there are one or two monsters reading this. If that’s you, 🖕.

In an interview, I was asked how to stop ethical violations in the healing arts (psychedelic healing) space. I was so naive. I suggested more education, more reflection on our shadow, more understanding of our triggers. In my little mind, I just figured that most people were like me; well-meaning, but just a little clumsy, ignorant, and immature. People who just needed their rough edges smoothed out so they would feel safer to other people’s nervous system and not cause harm accidentally or impulsively.

I mean, I knew there were legitimately messed-up things happening somewhere, but I thought it was far away. Certainly further away than 2 degrees of separation.

But they walk among us, and it doesn’t seem like that’s going to change any time soon. We’ve got to be on the watch. It seems to be everywhere. It’s not just about the healing arts world. It’s mostly not the healing arts world, although it’s probably the most painful when it is. The actions of Deepak, Yogi Bhajan, and John of God don’t mean all healers are rotten, any more than Puff Daddy’s actions represent all musicians.

I didn’t even have time to talk about John of God, who is also just a few degrees away from Epstein, and had similar hobbies. (John of God -> Oprah -> Deepak -> Epstein)

I wish I were wrong about the world being wrong; I wish all of us with our vague sense that things were just off were wrong. I don’t like fixating on the negative. I really don’t like fixating on things that I don’t can’t change. I like being proactive. It’s hard right now, but I’m still going to try.

I like to believe that continuing to air this out is proactive. I think taking stock of ourselves is proactive. I’ve never before described myself as I have above. Well-meaning but clumsy. Often ignorant, I know not what I do (until the mushrooms point it out in phantasmagorical technicolor.) I think we need to make these distinctions between the truly nefarious and the regular folks who mess up. I think sometimes, our outrage at the former ends up being directed at the latter.

I’ve had students in my training program worry about these things. “How much do I have to worry about causing harm?” one asked, “It seems like every time I read something, it reinforces that no matter what I do, I’m going to harm someone. I’m a good person, I mean well, and I think if I go into a session anxious about everything that could go wrong, that might just make it more likely to happen.

his is not the student I’m worried about; she’s humble, conscientious, and thoughtful. She’s what we need in a world where we’re increasingly faced with incomprehensible evil.
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They say that if you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention. It’s no place to stay. You can’t redline your emotional life over this. If you’re not grateful, you’re not paying attention. I’m grateful I am paying attention. I’m grateful the truth comes out, even if it’s slowly, and it raises more questions than it answers. I’m grateful that I can take hard times and be inspired to be better, act more consciously, and build alliances with like-minded, good-hearted people. I’m grateful you’re here to read this. I’m grateful we’ve got each other.

Bonus points, what do these guys have in common?

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