5 Black Personal Development Gurus To Follow
By: Cathy Assoba
Tags: Personal Development, Black Culture, Black Writers, Black Women

5 Black Personal Development Gurus To Follow

For a more wholesome version of you

Photo Credit: Dani Pendergast

I think it is important that everyone should be humble enough to accept being a student and being open to learning from people in a wide array of areas. It can teach you clarity and prosperity and not just in terms of wealth but also in spiritual, mental physical wellbeing.

Anthony ONeal

For many, he is primarily known for working alongside Dave Ramsey on the Ramsey Network. Anthony ONeal aims to teach people to fight generational poverty and provide financial literacy for people to learn how to be the first person in their family to move up the social and economic ladder.

Through his Youtube channel filled with learning how to be wise with spending while at university, he lets us know that most of us make the worst financial decisions due to a wide array of reasons, from lack of education in the financial field to learning the life skills of simply being an adult. Anthony is a guide on how, with hard work, you can transform your life.

He shares his own stories from how he learned to budget for dating a woman. He shares his experience of how a woman gaslighted him as she wanted them to go on a date in a place which at the time was out of his budget for the month, which, to his benefit, has allowed him to learn more about people’s intentions as a result.

What I particularly enjoy about Mr. ONeal’s nature, aside from his objectives to teach people how to cut generational hardships from a black perspective, is how open and relatable he is — from teaching people to avoid boasting and spending money unnecessarily to focusing on the end goal of spending and investing on assets with financial longevity.

He was once homeless at only age 19 and is now debt-free today; naturally, he is the best-selling author of Destroy Your Student Loan Debt — a step-by-step method to get people to reduce the student loan fast.

Patricia Bright

A woman with many titles. One of the OG’s of black British YouTubers becoming influencers. As a teen, I was most inspired and possibly influenced as she a fellow black British woman. She started her career in finance as a graduate. She then moved on to become a fashion, beauty, and lifestyle YouTuber full time. Due to her consistency on the platform, she gained a huge audience and became an online big sister for many.

Her work ethic is admirable from early days as a uni student until now she is now a mother of 2 and has branched into personal development. With a separate channel called The Break and her podcast Caught Off Guard, she teaches her audience how to handle their finances and shows off her career that demonstrates how she has added more titles to her name by expanding her property portfolio by interviewing other creatives and leaders in the various industries who have excelled in their market organically.

My favorite current episode is blogger Alex Stedman’s interview, who explains her career ladder candidly, the pay gap in the fashion industry in the UK, and how she used her annual leave to work on freelance gigs led to her role to date with her budgeting blog.

Patricia is an unstoppable force, and I’m excited to see what else she has to bring to the table and what more I can learn from her.

Tasha Cochran

Founder of the blog One Big Happy Life, mother, author, and lawyer Tasha Cochran is the epitome of personal development. On her website, she discusses her journey from a student at Yale to earning $14,000 annually to now running a six-figure online business and how she managed to get there, including the highs and the lows of having to do a 3 hour round commute to work (I’ll remember to complain less) make it through studying to become an attorney.

I first discovered Tasha on her series with The Financial Diet, whereby her personality and brains were infectious, and like everyone I find this way, I want to discover more. You can find her on her YouTube channel and her blog discussing all things wealth management alongside her family.

Jamel Davenport

Adding him to the list was slightly biased as he is one of my favorites to go to. He’s beyond wise and a very articulate Life coach. I have to confess I first discovered him a few years ago when I had a love for reality tv (I was a young undergrad student, so please don’t judge), but thanks to trash tv and Rob Kardashian, I discovered how wholesome his work is.

Mr. Davenport was en route to become an attorney; however, through his journey, he encountered that being a personal development coach intertwining psychological and physiological was his purpose.

The Certified Life Coach of over 15 years also has a platform — LOS Artist for artists in LA. As LA is one of the most creatives cities globally, he implements a personal and professional program for transformation in problem areas that are conscious and subconscious.

Discover his website to learn more about his works.

Stacey Flowers

Other than having the perfect name, she is commonly known for her Ted talks with over 1.2 million views, where she details that we need five types of people to maintain happiness. A cheerleader, mentor, coach, friend, and peer. From then on, I took on her advice and learned to be ok with putting people in categories and understanding my relationships with people better.In time wherein my life, where I was looking for substance, I stumbled upon her video, and I learned the value of having a mentor.

Before her rise as a Ted Talks speaker, Stacey became a Mother at only seventeen years old and still in senior high school. Her ambition and motivation led her to become a public speaker, podcast host, and YouTuber. Her content demonstrates budgeting, life advice, and learning how to maximize your potential; a true inspiration of hard works pays off.