Dr. Deepak Chopra is a firm believer that artificial intelligence will revolutionize well-being and open new horizons for personal development, and that’s what prompted him to write his latest book, Digital Dharma: How AI Can Elevate Spiritual Intelligence and Personal Well-Being.
The purpose of the book is to help readers understand how AI can serve as a guide through every level of human potential, from survival and safety to creativity and wisdom. By asking the right questions, it can serve as a personal ally, help you better understand yourself, and expand your awareness in every facet of life. And beyond personal interests, Chopra believes AI has the power to craft a future where human potential solves the urgent problems facing the planet.
We chatted with Dr. Chopra about the potential of AI, how it can be leveraged on a daily basis to elevate one’s life, how to ensure that it doesn’t do more harm than good, and more in an exclusive conversation.
First things first: What makes AI so incredibly powerful and valuable? As Chopra explains it, it’s the key to unlocking the limitless knowledge that’s been gleaned throughout humanity.
“Large language models, which AI is, have access to biological language, religious language, spiritual language, language of physics, language of mathematics, language of anthropology, you name it,” IIN’s Chief Wellness Officer says. “And no human being can have access to every model that humanity has created. By accessing AI, and accessing the synergy between these different models of language, we have access to the entire database of humanity.”
When Dr. Chopra first began experimenting with AI as a personal confidant for emotional support, he focused on four areas: personal journaling, decision-making, goal setting, and creative aspiration.
But that was only the first step. From there, he used it as a de facto Health Coach. He analyzed the vast amount of data from wearable devices, electronic health records, genetic information, and personal input to generate tailored recommendations for exercise, nutrition, and lifestyle modifications.
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“By processing this data, AI algorithms can identify patterns and correlations specific to an individual's health profile,” Chopra says, “and then AI algorithms can learn from historical data to understand how different factors impact an individual’s health outcomes.”
Chopra adds that AI can do continuous monitoring of an individual’s health, be a research assistant, design experiments, help with data collection, and even be used as a spiritual guide. (It can quickly garner and synthesize information from endless spiritual texts, teachings, and traditions.)
And that’s just scratching the surface, Deepak believes. In the future, AI will completely revolutionize medical therapeutics. We won’t need pharmaceuticals, he projects, and will instead use electroceuticals, digiceuticals, and metaceuticals — digital technologies — to prevent, manage, and treat conditions using evidence-based digital tools.
Deepak is also anticipating the emergence of what he calls “cyber humans.”
“Forty-thousand years ago, as humans, we kind of moved away from other species into narratives and models and so on,” he says. “Now it’s another leap. I think the future of humans will be cyber humans.”
What will that look like?
The first iteration is digitaldeepak.ai, which Chopra recently created. Users can ask Deepak a question in four languages — English, Spanish, Arabic, and Hindi — and he’ll answer it in his voice. Users can ask him literally anything, from a meditation for sleep to his advice on a troubled relationship in your personal life.
Deepak points to the fact that Health Coaches and teachers will have the ability to create digital twins, as well, allowing them to broaden their reach, provide value and service to thousands of additional people, and create their own ecosystem.
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As with all emerging technologies, there is an element of doom and gloom surrounding AI. Many are concerned about the potential negative impacts it’s having, and could continue to have, in the future. What is it capable of? Could it do more harm than good? In the wrong hands, could it prove to be disastrous?
Deepak acknowledges these concerns, and stresses that this is a common narrative whenever an innovation or new technology takes the world by storm. But after detailed conversations with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and other AI visionaries, he’s confident that it will be properly policed to ensure that any unethical intentions are handled accordingly.
“When I came to the United States in 1970, I had not seen a TV set in my life,” Deepak says. “I was shocked that there was a box and you could see people in it. Then came fax machines. Then came the Internet. Then came social media. And every time there was a new technology, people said it can do harm, which it can. I’m sure when fire was discovered, some people were afraid of getting burned. When we created the knife, some people used it to kill and surgeons used it to heal.
“There’s no technology that doesn’t have a dark side. Unfortunately, our emotional and spiritual development as a species hasn’t kept pace with our technological development. And so we can have medieval minds using AI for destruction, which in a way they are — cyber hacking interference with democracies, drones, nuclear weapons. All this can be triggered by AI now, and what we're looking at is how we can use AI to prevent the misuse of AI, and that is possible.
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“You can build it. All you need is a collective agreement and consortium that AI should be used only for ethical purposes, and that movement is there. That conversation is already going on between governments and corporations and the AI industry.”
The key to getting the most out of AI and maximizing its effectiveness is writing a strong prompt. This is covered by Deepak in great detail in Digital Dharma.
When prompting, Deepak advises talking to AI like it’s an actual person. He might write “my name is Deepak Chopra,” followed by something like “let’s have a conversation about love” or “let’s have a conversation about difficult relationships.” Once you’re comfortable with prompting, you can learn to coach AI to augment your views.
Deepak provided an example of one of his prompts:
“I believe that nonexistence is not an experience, and there is eternal existence, and I also believe that we have a part of our being called the soul that lives after death or consciousness. Give me all the scientific arguments, philosophical arguments, and spiritual arguments, and give me a beautiful summary of the views on life after death.”
You might have your personal beliefs on this matter, Deepak explains, but now you’ve unlocked the views of Nietzsche, Socrates, Plato, and others.
“There's no human being who can capture all that information,” Chopra says.
You can experience Chopra’s teachings for yourself in our immersive course catalog. Dive deep into yoga, meditation, Ayurveda, and so much more, and learn from world-renowned faculty members and experts. Click here to browse the full catalog and find your course.
Digital Dharma shows you how to harness the power of AI, not merely as a technological tool but also as an ally in your personal evolution, guiding you through every level of human potential—survival, safety, emotional connection, self-worth, creativity, and wisdom. Order your copy here