There comes a time when you feel your life is heading towards an inevitable outcome. You realise your star is way past the zenith, and you don't have much longer. You either come to terms with that and live the rest of your life as best as you can, or you become depressed, then desperate. Then you start doing stupid things.
This seems to be the tragic theme currently affecting several more or less notorious figures in Western Occulture. They notice that their time in the spotlight has passed or is rapidly passing, that the books they published ages ago are collecting dust in some metaphorical dark archive full of cobwebs and mould, and that their YouTube videos are receiving fewer views and likes day by day. They look in the mirror and see grey-turning-white hair, wrinkles, and a not-so-distant hole in the ground.
Instead of using any occult knowledge and expertise they've acquired over time to prepare for the beyond while making the rest of their earthly days as comfortable as possible, they desperately seek newer sources for validation, not to mention income. Thus, they end up associating with all sorts of shady people no one knows about, people who, through a funny twist of fate, have become local gurus in their own miserable corner of the world, having gathered a bunch of gullible followers they constantly milk for cash.