Deepak Chopra, Jeffrey Epstein, and the Spiritual Abuse Crisis

A veteran cult reporter spills the truth about the spiritual industry

I’m Be Scofield, founder of The Guru Magazine and the journalist behind the hit HBO series on the Love Has Won cult. I’ve spent a decade reporting on spiritual power, abuse, and the machinery that protects it. My investigations have been cited by The New York Times, Rolling Stone, The Washington Post, People and more.

SEE ALSO: Why Are Publishers Still Profiting From Abusive Gurus?

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The Deepak Chopra–Epstein scandal is cracking open something the spirituality industry has kept hidden for years. People are waking up to the abuse, manipulation, and cover-ups that hide inside “love and light” culture, protected by fame, charisma, and the language of enlightenment.

I’ve spent a decade reporting inside this ecosystem. I’m here to say it’s way worse than you think. Many of the most famous names in the industry are implicated—by what they did, what they enabled, or what they helped cover up.

To be frank, I’ve never seen so many industry insiders call out a spiritual guru as they are with Chopra. My response: Welcome to the club. If you are serious, and this isn’t just an easy dunk for cred or views, then please find the courage to speak about the “beloved” gurus mentioned below. Stop idolizing them and actually be willing to challenge the status quo.

Modern spirituality has a significant “protection” problem. The biggest teachers share the same conferences, publishers, podcasts, donors, and groupies. So when abuse happens, they either ignore it or manage and minimize it. Calling out a famous guru when it’s not “cool” to do so yet can jeopardize their own power and influence.

Maybe this sudden flux of attention around spiritual abuse will finally make people willing to really look at the long-standing allegations surrounding some of the biggest names in the field. I hope so. But I’m skeptical, because there’s too much money and opportunity at stake—book deals, speaking fees, retreats, courses, and a whole economy built to keep the brand clean.

Below are “Guru Files” on three of the most influential names in modern spirituality. In each one, there are whistleblowers, specific allegations backed by documents or firsthand accounts, and victims whose stories were ignored—or actively managed—so the brand could keep selling books, programs, and “healing.” I’ve spent years deeply reporting stories like these.

The Guru Files will be a section on this site, so be sure to sign up to receive the next installments. And don’t skip the conclusion because I lay out just how much of a hot mess the industry is.

Guru File #1: Chogyam Trungpa

Let’s start with Chogyam Trungpa, founder of Shambhala Buddhism, who is still revered as one of the most influential spiritual figures of our time. He’s sold millions of books and founded Naropa University in Boulder, CO.

He was a known pedophile.

Trungpa infamously made out with a 13-year old girl in front of his staff and students. Una Morera witnessed it and shared her firsthand account in a podcast. “I realized I was now watching Trungpa passionately kissing Sarah, like tongue deep kissing her,” she says of the 13-yr-old girl. “Then I looked up at the adults who were standing up and surrounding us...I saw them watching Trungpa kissing Sarah too, where there was no concern for her. Amongst the other teenagers, I found alarm in their faces. Their eyes were zigzagging all over the place, searching for one another’s, but as the kiss continued, they didn’t make a move or do anything.”

One of his seven ex-wives recalls Trungpa “demanding women and girls at all hours of the day and night, some of them teenagers.”

If you have a problem with Deepak Chopra’s ties to Epstein, then Trungpa should outrage you.

Enter Pema Chodron.

She’s one of the most famous spiritual teachers in the world. The frequent Oprah guest is a best-selling author of popular books like When Things Fall Apart.

Chodron is a lifelong devotee of Chogyam Trungpa and one of his principal defenders.

She revealed to a staff member named Fred Coulson the extent of her devotion. “She then told me that if she were shown photos of her guru Chogyam Trungpa molesting children her devotion would be the same,” Coulson states.

What?

I got an email this morning from Sounds True, the largest online spiritual publisher, selling me on a Pema Chodron course called “The Freedom to Love.”

For her guru, Chogyam Trungpa, the freedom to love meant something much more sinister.

Chodron was forced to apologize on Oprah for her role in enabling sexual abuse within Shambhala.

A female student went to Chodron and told her she had been raped and impregnated by her Shambhala center’s leader. She dismissed her claims. “I don’t believe you,” Chodron scoffed. Later, she told her, “If it’s true, I suspect you were into it.”

There are others too. “She basically ripped me apart and said I wasn’t being compassionate enough toward my abuser, and if I didn’t like it I should leave Buddhism,” a student of Chodron stated. “There are a number of people (I’m one) she retraumatized with her responses to requests for help,” writes Fionna Bright. “What she did to me was devastating. Her approach has been to deny and scold, to blame the victim.”

When asked about women who come to her with issues with male teachers, Chodron replied, “Blaming others never heals anything.”

To this day Chodron stands by Chogyam Trungpa—despite his known sexual exploits with teens and women, a widely known cocaine habit, alcoholism, having a couple forcibly stripped naked in public, and various other abuses.

Walk into the Boulder Bookstore (run by a devotee) and turn right after the counter. You’ll find an entire section dedicated to Trungpa’s lineage, including books by his son Mipham who was ousted for a serious sexual abuse scandal. Many Shambhala devotees remained loyal to him, hoping he’d return as the leader.

As long as child abusers and their defenders continue to be revered in modern spirituality, our task is far from over.

You can read the three-part series I’ve done on Shambhala here. It covers Trungpa and the aftermath of his legacy and abuses by his students, including Pema Chodron, Reggie Ray of Dharma Ocean, and Tslutrim Allione of Tara Mandala.

Guru File #2: Sadhguru

Let’s pivot to the most famous celebrity guru in the world: Sadhguru.

He required young girls to be topless in their ceremonies. A former staff member named Chandra was there. She witnessed it. I interviewed her. “He comes up to them and runs his hand up and down their spine and touches them on the back,” Chandra told me. “He says it does things to their consciousness.”

We also have email proof of Sadhguru acknowledging this.

Here a staff member writes to another staff member, “I was not aware at all that the young adolescent girls are asked to go in to the shrine for their Bala bhramachari initiation bare-chested. This is unacceptable. I am glad you prevailed upon the master and stopped it.”

This email from a staff member to Sadhguru is remarkably revealing. She warns him that requiring girls to be nude from the waist up is “very dangerous” and could be misunderstood:

During initiation, the girls are asked to removed the upper cloth so the spine is fully exposed. As i have expressed earlier, I have some reservations about this and feel this needs to be revisited keeping in mind that they are minor girls and however overwhelmed and obedient they may be at that time, we cannot expect all of them to keep it confidential or not to discuss it at all. Girls being girls will have the tendency to either share if not now, sometime later with their parents or some teacher who is close to them. Also they are here not out of their own choice but because of their parents and the parents are unaware of this. This is very dangerous as it can be perceived in a completely different way both by adults and maybe by the child as well. Also we have seen that their face changes when we tell them to do this before initiation.”

She continues, “Also there is a huge risk factor involved for the institution in case it goes negative...So from now it’s better to initiate the girls with their upper body properly covered. Request if we can go ahead.”

Sadhguru replies, “Yes to both.”

I interviewed several of Sadhguru’s former senior staff and devotees, who reported an array of abuses, including being coerced into sexual acts.

“Under the guise of it being a ‘sacred process,’ where the body is ‘simply a tool,’ I was asked to remove my blouse and given a sacred thread to tie around my waist to help facilitate an energy transmission,” a woman named “Rebecca” told me. She was topless in front of him as part of the energetic ritual. “He said it allows you to connect up with him better.”

She also told me he “is a predator” and that he groomed women with “well-established patterns.”

“Once that trust and connection was established, it was exploited to perform various tantric processes, including performing oral sex. All of this was done so I could ‘improve my receptivity’ and help enhance human consciousness.”

Several women told me Sadhguru required them to be topless in ceremonies as well, and he ran his hand up and down their spines. In some initiation ceremonies, both men and women were required to be fully nude.

For decades Sadhguru systematically employed cult-like tactics to break down his followers and exploit them for money. After reading my series a psychologist with training in cult dynamics concluded, “It’s a full-blown authoritarian structure…every red flag is there psychologically, legally, ethically.”

Sadhguru sells $100 photos of his feet, $800–$3,333 “consecrated” devices, workshops that run $5,750 to $8,600, and even pushes a tithe. He tells his followers “they will be better able to achieve spiritual growth” with 7% less income.

You can read my series on Sadhguru here: Part 1 and Part 2. I cover many more allegations, including sexual misconduct, verbal abuse, the suspicious case of his wife’s death, and other deaths under questionable circumstances.

SEE ALSO: What Happened to Sadhguru’s Wife? Did Sadhguru’s wife die from enlightenment, as he claims, or was it foul play?

Guru File #3: Amma

Perhaps the second-most famous spiritual guru in the world is Amma, the hugging saint. She built her brand as a divine, godlike being who is celibate.

It’s not true.

Jacques Albohair was her personal translator for 13 years. He was with her from the beginning in the early 1980s.

He wrote a book that included details about sexual encounters with Amma. I also interviewed him. You can watch the video here. In his book, he describes the sexual encounters:

Often, I would massage her feet or legs and then she would eventually invite me to lie down next to her. Then she would take my hand and put it on her breasts. Often, she would pull out one of her breasts and give me her nipple to suck. Sometimes she would remove her bra and present me her full bare chest. Several times she lifted her petticoat, spread her thighs, and invited me to put my penis on her pubis, then on her outer lips. I held on to what I knew of neo tantra and felt this was the right moment to practice. It was important to me to stay as tantric as possible, to control my pleasure and my excitement and not to slip into basic sexuality. Then she invited me to rock my hips and so I ended up rubbing my erect penis over the whole height of her vulva. It could continue for quite some time. It was erotic, exciting, and serene at the same time. From her bed, I saw the starry sky through the window, sometimes the light of the moon. We had developed this practice which we used several times. Whenever the opportunity presented itself, I was willing.

One of the many sexual encounters happened while they were traveling in Italy.

During one of the late-night meetings, I had with her in Italy, in a small room where Gail was already sleeping, she got off her bed, put a blanket on the floor and offered me to join her. This time we were lying on our side. We got into the scissors position and she invited me again to resume our practice. I do not know how much time had passed and I think she was half asleep. She must have started to lubricate abundantly because after a while the glans of my penis slipped and nested between her lips against the wet opening of her vagina. Despite the intense excitement and pleasure, once tucked in this spot, I froze. I tried to stay still in this position.

Allegations that Amma is sexual also come from her former personal attendant of 20 years, Gail Tredwell. She too was with Amma from the beginning in the early 1980s. Tredwell also published a book detailing an array of abuses by Amma, including physical and verbal abuse, stealing donations, and fraud.

Tredwell writes:

I witnessed with my own eyes Amma and Balu having sex. We had just arrived on the Big Island of Hawaii, and Balu was alone with Amma in her room. I stepped onto the verandah of the house and, as I turned, I could see them through the open windows of her room. In a glimpse I saw the two of them in bed together. Amma’s legs were spread. Naked from the waist down, Balu was moving on top of her. They had forgotten to close the windows, perhaps not realizing that their room overlooked the adjacent verandah. I gasped and swiftly ducked so that they wouldn’t see me. I was livid.

In Part 1 of my expose, I detail Tredwell’s further accounts of witnessing Amma being sexual with male followers.

Amma also claims to be God. The biographies and books about her that she sells claim she is “omniscient” and “omnipresent.” One states, “Amma is a fully God-realized Master who has no karma Herself.” Regarding her initial divine incarnation, she says, “I was able to know everything about everyone...I was fully aware that I myself was Krishna.”

The biographies she sells also claim she does spectacular miracles like resurrecting children from the dead, healing paralyzed people, curing cancer, shooting fireballs out of her hands, feeding the masses with little food, and more.

But, wait, there’s more.

Jacques Albohair, Gail Tredwell, and at least two other women witnessed or experienced Amma’s physical and verbal abuses.

“She became extremely ill-tempered and would hit, kick, slap, punch, rip me by the hair for the slightest mistake and sometimes for no reason at all,” Tredwell writes in her book. “Towards the end, her signature move became to grab me by the throat with one hand, dig her nails in and claw towards the center. I was left with scratch marks and sometimes blood.”

A few years ago I interviewed Tredwell in person and heard firsthand her accounts of being abused by Amma.

“Amma snatched the steel tumbler from her hand,” Albohair writes in his book. “Gail turned to rush back upstairs to finish making the tea but when Amma saw the contents of the cup, she exclaimed: ‘Since when have I drunk milk!’ and hurled the full tumbler across the room. Gail stood, frozen in amazement. In an explosion of rage Amma then grabbed Gail’s sari and began to tear it apart with her teeth.” Albohair said Tredwell returned a few minutes later with a cup of tea. Amma then said to her, “If you come near me, I will stab you to death. I am actually dreaming about it!” Amma then hit herself three times in the head. Gail hesitated to leave, and Amma added, “If you do not leave the room right away, I’ll chop off my hands and feet!”

Tredwell describes an incident where Amma violently raged at her.

Amma entered her room, grabbed hold of the door, and slammed it shut with such thunderous might that the entire brick wall shook. Immediately she rushed over to Vidya and rammed her up against the panel of switches by the door. Then she turned and came charging at me like a raging bull. Grabbing a fist full of my hair, she flung me to the ground and spun me around over the smoothly polished linoleum floor as she kicked me a few times.

“How many times have I told you to check on the kitchen? You lazy, good for nothing bitch, just sitting around in my room like a queen.”

Releasing me from her grip, she turned and charged toward Vidya again. After I stood up and regained my senses, I had to laugh. Instead of standing like a helpless rag doll and meekly accepting another pounding, Vidya had a better idea. She ran for her life up the stairs with Amma hot on her heels. I followed, thinking that once it was all over, we could make an easy exit through the upper level across the bridge to the temple building. Now Vidya was trapped in the corner of the upstairs room in the process of receiving a couple of slaps. Running out of steam, Amma turned to me and said, “Piss off. Piss off, the both of you.” Then she stormed back to her room.

A woman named “Ritika” (alias) told me during an interview that she was physically abused by Amma and witnessed her hitting others. She lived at the ashram for 17 years. “She took a stick and started beating me,” Ritika told me of one incident. “She jumped at me and and slapped my face,” she says of another occasion that Amma hit her.

Ritika told me she witnessed Amma hit Gail Tredwell and Lakshmi “many times.” Small things like a slight change in the flavor of her curry or the whiteness of her dress would lead Amma to hit. Ritika said she yelled and cursed at anyone who was close to her many times. “She will throw anything that’s in her hands,” she told me. “We would be trembling. We were all afraid of her when she’s in a bad mood.”

In 2012 Rolling Stone did a story Amma where they interviewed Tredwell about the abuse. The reporter also spoke to a former devotee who claimed to have been slapped by Amma and witnessed similar abusive treatment of others at the India ashram.

Like Sadhguru, Amma also sells “devotion” in the form of $200 dolls of herself, $250–$300 “blessed and worn” jewelry, and other objects imbued with her “energy.”

You can read Part 1 and Part 2 of my series on Amma. In the second part, I explain how she built her cult-like following and ashram from the early days.

The Implosion

To put it bluntly: modern spirituality is a hot mess. And the rot isn’t just “out there” at the margins—it’s protected from the top down. The biggest gurus, spiritual publishing houses, podcasters, and organizations preserve the status quo because the status quo pays. Anyone who has watched this world for more than five minutes knows it.

I’m not being overly dramatic. I’m describing a pattern.

Over the last few decades, allegations of abuse have touched nearly every major modern yoga lineage—physical abuse, verbal abuse, sexual misconduct, financial exploitation, and systemic cover-ups. Many of the world’s most prominent Buddhist teachers and institutions have been rocked by scandals. The same is true in the non-dual and Hindu “teacher” circuit, where self-proclaimed masters have repeatedly been exposed running coercive, abusive cults. The list is too long to do justice here—and in some cases it includes allegations of child sexual abuse.

Even the “legendary” figures are implicated. Take Swami Satchidananda, the so-called “Woodstock guru” associated with Integral Yoga: a 2024 lawsuit alleges he sexually abused multiple female students over decades, and that the institution failed to investigate and enabled the abuse. Another titan, Muktananda of Siddha Yoga, was the subject of a 2023 lawsuit that alleges widespread sexual abuse, including of women and girls, and claims that leadership—including Gurumayi—helped facilitate access to victims. And if you can stomach it, the allegations surrounding Yogi Bhajan and Kundalini Yoga are among the most disturbing in the modern spiritual canon.

So yes—the list goes on and on. But the bottom line is simple: many of the most prominent, influential spiritual teachers of the last 75 years, and the organizations built around them, have been compromised at the core.

And we’re watching the same dynamics play out in real time with the modern celebrity gurus who dominate the spiritual airwaves today—Amma and Sadhguru included.

To undo this, we have to cut the bullshit. Not “everyone has a shadow.” Not “imperfect teachers.” Not “we’re all human.” Those phrases excuse systems of coercion.

Newsflash: it’s not “human” to build destructive cults, foster dependency, and systematically abuse and rape followers.

We’re dealing with a power structure—one that has shaped the spiritual imagination of millions. Toxic gurus teach toxic ideologies, build toxic institutions, and then call the fallout “healing.” Publishers and podcasters then regurgitate these toxic ideas helping to normalize them.

If there’s any way out of this, it starts with brutal honesty: naming what’s happening, refusing the spiritual spin, and holding these figures to the same basic standards we expect everywhere else.

If you’re tired of gurus telling you to shut off your mind while they keep theirs active to control you, then you are ready. If you are tired of gurus telling you to not have sex while they secretly have sex with followers, then you are ready. If you are tired of being told abusive behaviors are beneficial for your spiritual growth, then you are ready.

I’m here for it. Please follow The Savior Complex to join me.

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Be Scofield is a prominent cult reporter and founder of The Guru Magazine. Her investigations have been cited by The New York Times, Rolling Stone, and People and have served as the basis for the HBO series Love Has Won, as well as coverage on Dateline, VICE, and Netflix. She holds a Master of Divinity (MDiv) from the Graduate Theological Union.