Deepak Chopra

Early life and education Chopra was born in New Delhi, British India to Punjabi Hindu parents Krishan Lal Chopra (1919–2001) and Pushpa Chopra. His paternal grandfather was a sergeant in the British Indian Army. His father was a prominent cardiologist, head of the department of medicine and cardiology at New Delhi's Moolchand Khairati Ram Hospital for over 25 years, and was also a lieutenant in the British army, serving as an army doctor at the front at Burma and acting as a medical adviser to Lord Mountbatten, viceroy of India. , Chopra's younger brother, Sanjiv Chopra, was a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and on staff at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Chopra studied at St. Columba's School in New Delhi and graduated from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, in 1969. He spent his first months as a doctor working in rural India, including, he writes, six months in a village where the lights went out whenever it rained. It was during his early career that he was drawn to study endocrinology, particularly neuroendocrinology, to find a biological basis for the influence of thoughts and emotions. He married in India in 1970 before emigrating, with his wife, to the United States that same year. Between 1971 and 1977, he completed residencies in internal medicine at the Lahey Clinic in Burlington, Massachusetts, the VA Medical Center, St Elizabeth's Medical Center, and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. He earned his license to practice medicine in the state of Massachusetts in 1973, becoming board certified in internal medicine, specializing in endocrinology. East Coast years Chopra taught at the medical schools of Tufts University, Boston University, and Harvard University, and became Chief of Staff at the New England Memorial Hospital (NEMH) (later known as the Boston Regional Medical Center) in Stoneham, Massachusetts before establishing a private practice in Boston in endocrinology. was an influence on Chopra in the 1980s. While visiting New Delhi in 1981, he met the Ayurvedic physician Brihaspati Dev Triguna, head of the Indian Council for Ayurvedic Medicine, whose advice prompted him to begin investigating Ayurvedic practices. Chopra was "drinking black coffee by the hour and smoking at least a pack of cigarettes a day". He took up Transcendental Meditation to help him stop and, , he continued to meditate for two hours every morning and half an hour in the evening. Chopra's involvement with TM led to a meeting in 1985 with the leader of the TM movement, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, who asked him to establish an Ayurvedic health center. He left his position at the NEMH. Chopra said that one of the reasons he left was his disenchantment at having to prescribe too many drugs: "[W]hen all you do is prescribe medication, you start to feel like a legalized drug pusher. That doesn't mean that all prescriptions are useless, but it is true that 80 percent of all drugs prescribed today are of optional or marginal benefit." He became the founding president of the American Association of Ayurvedic Medicine, one of the founders of Maharishi Ayur-Veda Products International, and medical director of the Maharishi Ayur-Veda Health Center in Lancaster, Massachusetts. The center charged between $2,850 and $3,950 per week for Ayurvedic cleansing rituals such as massages, enemas, and oil baths, and TM lessons cost an additional $1,000. Celebrity patients included Elizabeth Taylor. Chopra also became one of the TM movement's spokespeople. In 1989, the Maharishi awarded him the title "Dhanvantari of Heaven and Earth" (Dhanvantari was the Hindu physician to the gods). That year Chopra's Quantum Healing: Exploring the Frontiers of Mind/Body Medicine was published, followed by Perfect Health: The Complete Mind/Body Guide (1990). Chopra and Jackson first met in 1988 and remained friends for 20 years. When Jackson died in 2009 after being administered prescription drugs, Chopra said he hoped it would be a call to action against the "cult of drug-pushing doctors, with their co-dependent relationships with addicted celebrities". Chopra left the Transcendental Meditation movement around the time he moved to California in January 1993. Mahesh Yogi claimed that Chopra had competed for the Maharishi's position as guru, although Chopra rejected this. According to Robert Todd Carroll, Chopra left the TM organization when it "became too stressful" and was a "hindrance to his success". Cynthia Ann Humes writes that the Maharishi was concerned, and not only with regard to Chopra, that rival systems were being taught at lower prices. Chopra, for his part, was worried that his close association with the TM movement might prevent Ayurvedic medicine from being accepted as legitimate, particularly after the problems with the JAMA article. He also stated that he had become uncomfortable with what seemed like a "cultish atmosphere around Maharishi". In 1995, Chopra was not licensed to practice medicine in California where he had a clinic. However, he did not see patients at this clinic "as a doctor" during this time. Chopra is the owner and supervisor of the Mind-Body Medical Group within the Chopra Center, which in addition to standard medical treatment offers personalized advice about nutrition, sleep-wake cycles, and stress management based on mainstream medicine and Ayurveda. He is a fellow of the American College of Physicians and member of the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists. Alternative medicine business Chopra's book Ageless Body, Timeless Mind: The Quantum Alternative to Growing Old was published in 1993. The book and his friendship with Michael Jackson gained him an interview on July 12 that year on Oprah. Paul Offit writes that within 24 hours Chopra had sold 137,000 copies of his book and 400,000 by the end of the week. Four days after the interview, the Maharishi National Council of the Age of Enlightenment wrote to TM centers in the United States, instructing them not to promote Chopra, and his name and books were removed from the movement's literature and health centers. Neuroscientist Tony Nader became the movement's new "Dhanvantari of Heaven and Earth". Sharp HealthCare changed ownership in 1996 and Chopra left to set up the Chopra Center for Wellbeing with neurologist David Simon, which was located at Omni La Costa Resort & Spa in Carlsbad, California. Chopra Center in Carlsbad, California has since closed after Chopra sold Chopra Global to the Healing Company in 2023, where he served as chief scientific adviser. In his 2013 book, Do You Believe in Magic?, Paul Offit writes that Chopra's business grossed approximately $20 million annually, and was built on the sale of various alternative medicine products such as herbal supplements, massage oils, books, videos and courses. A year's worth of products for "anti-aging" can cost up to $10,000, Offit wrote. Chopra himself was estimated to be worth over $80 million . , according to Srinivas Aravamudan, he was able to charge $25,000 to $30,000 per lecture five or six times a month. Medical anthropologist Hans Baer said Chopra was an example of a successful entrepreneur, but that he focused too much on serving the upper-class through an alternative to medical hegemony, rather than a truly holistic approach to health. Teaching and other roles Chopra serves as an adjunct professor in the marketing division at Columbia Business School. He serves as adjunct professor of executive programs at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. He participates annually as a lecturer at the Update in Internal Medicine event sponsored by Harvard Medical School and the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. In 2016, Chopra was promoted from voluntary assistant clinical professor to voluntary full clinical professor at the University of California, San Diego in their Department of Family Medicine and Public Health. Robert Carroll writes of Chopra charging $25,000 per lecture, "giving spiritual advice while warning against the ill effects of materialism". Chopra founded the American Association of Ayurvedic Medicine (AAAM) and Maharishi AyurVeda Products International, though he later distanced himself from these organizations. Since 2004, he has been a board member of Men's Wearhouse, a men's clothing distributor. In 2005, Chopra was appointed as a senior scientist at The Gallup Organization. In 2006, he launched Virgin Comics with his son Gotham Chopra and entrepreneur Richard Branson. In 2009, Chopra founded the , a tax-exempt 501(c) organization that raises funds to promote and research alternative health. The Foundation sponsors annual Sages and Scientists conferences. He sits on the board of advisors of the National Ayurvedic Medical Association, an organization based in the United States. In July 2023, Chopra and the Foundation co-hosted an event entitled "We the Future" alongside Kenneth Cole. It explored the future of AI, and supported guiding AI from the outset to create positive disruption and to on a worldwide basis establish peace as the cornerstone of innovation. In 2012, Chopra joined the board of advisors for tech startup State.com, creating a browsable network of structured opinions. In 2014, Chopra founded ISHAR (Integrative Studies Historical Archive and Repository). In 2015, Chopra partnered with businessman Paul Tudor Jones II to found JUST Capital, a non-profit firm which ranks companies in terms of just business practices in an effort to promote economic justice. Personal life Chopra and his wife have, , two adult children, (Gotham Chopra and Mallika Chopra) and three grandchildren. , Chopra lives in a "health-centric" condominium in Manhattan. He is a member of the inaugural class of the Great Immigrants Award named by Carnegie Corporation of New York (July 2006) According to documents from the Epstein files, Chopra had multiple meetings and email exchanges with Jeffrey Epstein. Chopra has denied any wrongdoing. ==Ideas and reception==