Personality Cults: Gwen Shamblin, Kevin Samuels, and Why You Shouldn’t Take Advice From Grifters

Gwen Shamblin via Wikipedia

So, I have a thing with advice. I don’t shun it, but I take it with a grain of salt. That’s interesting coming from me, a person who likes to give advice, and who sometimes writes articles giving it. A caveat is that I will be the first person to tell you that I do not write, or give advice, to change minds, or hearts, or lives. I don’t take advice from others to have my mind changed: or my heart or life. I’m cynical like that. I have only read one book that actually changed my life and that’s The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz.

I’m also a Christian, but I haven’t attended church every Sunday in years. That’s not a good thing or a bad thing, just a fact. While I do read my Bible daily and listen to sermons weekly, I do not think it’s necessary to go to church weekly. That’s a point of contention amongst a lot of Christians, even though I think it’s absolutely nothing wrong with attending church however many times a week you like.

However, I do have a problem with churches that center the preacher. You know those churches where the preacher is worshipped more than God. He or she becomes an absolute authority and even something like a deity. These churches are more like a cult than anything else, and these preachers usually live lavishly, sometimes becoming multi-millionaires.

This brings me to a man named Kevin Samuels and a woman named Gwen Shamblin. They are both deceased. Kevin Samuels died last week and Gwen Shamblin died a year ago in a plane crash.

Kevin Samuels was a self-proclaimed relationship expert and image consultant. He was controversial because of his style. His style was to call single women over 35 leftovers, tell “fat women” they needed to lose weight (in order to get a man and be their best), and to berate, humiliate, and verbally abuse the women who called into his show asking for help with finding themselves a man, not just any man, but a high-value man *insert eye-roll*. Here’s an example from his YouTube channel.