My “Ambitious” Challenge for 2024. Want to Join Me?

Written by Barbara Huson

I’ve taken on an Ambitious Challenge for 2024. Well, it’s actually not ‘ambitious’ in the conventional sense.

In fact, most would say it was the exact opposite. But if you feel spiritually adventurous, I invite you to join me.

I call it the No-Goals Challenge. Here’s why I’m doing it…

Anna, my youngest daughter, and I have a “God Box” ritual we do every January 1st. We write down our goals for the year on slips of paper. Then we read each one aloud as we drop them in our God Box, deliberately giving those goals up to the Divine.

The Subtle Art of Self -Sabotage

Written by Barbara Huson

There’s a line in A Course in Miracles that, long ago, had a big impact on me: “What you share you strengthen.”

It was when a coach gave me an intriguing assignment that the line really came to life for me. For 2 weeks, I was to simply observe my conversations, without changing a thing. Just notice what I talked about, the words I used, my typical reactions…you know, the stuff I was sharing with others.

What I saw was not pretty. I was constantly putting myself down, without ever realizing it. I’d dismiss my skills (“Oh, that’s no big deal”). I’d deflect praise (“I thought I was awful”). I’d diminish my successes (“But I could’ve done so much better”).

The 3 Questions—For Anyone Facing a Perplexing Challenge

Written by Barbara Huson

Recently, I stumbled on an unfamiliar book title, A Course of Love. It got my attention since it’s billed as a sequel to A Course in Miracles.

I was intrigued enough to click a link that promised to send me a chapter.

I haven’t read the book, so I can’t offer my opinion on the entire manuscript. But the chapter they sent had me sit up and take notice.

In the chapter were 3 questions that were so profound, I wanted to share them with you, especially if you’re facing a perplexing challenge.

These questions could be asked in situations as commonplace as balancing the checkbook, the chapter explained, or as momentous as a doctor’s diagnosis of a disease.

In other words, ask yourself these questions anytime you’re overwhelmed, anxious, confused, or even mildly puzzled.

Power-From-Within

Written by Barbara Huson

If you’re not where you want to be financially, consider this. Your difficulties may have little, if anything, to do with money, but your fear of or ambivalence about power…because you don’t understand true power.

Basically, there are 3 kinds of power:

1. Power Over (Domination)

2. Power With (Collaboration)

3. Power-From-Within (Dominion).

The drawback with the first two is that exercising power depends on others cooperating.

Shifting from Financial Misery to Financial Miracles in 3 Steps

Written by Barbara Huson

I spent much of my adult life in financial turmoil. Even as I learned more about money, I still felt out of control. Then everything changed.

The answer didn’t come from a financial text, but a spiritual one, A Course in Miracles.

From the Course I learned that we have “two thought systems” or two distinct “voices” in our head:

The voice of Fear (the Ego).
And the voice of Love (the Soul).

The Soul and the Ego have conflicting agendas. Thus, they produce dramatically different results–either miracles or misery.

“You cannot follow two masters,” the Course warns. “There is no compromise between the two.”

Those Ticking Time Bombs

Written by Lynda Jo Schuessler

To most people, obstacles are like ticking time bombs, something to quickly defuse or preferably avoid altogether.

But for the financially successful, obstacles are doorways to healing, portals to prosperity. What seems to get in the way is the way to transformation.

Difficulties are not diversions from Greatness but evidence of dysfunctional patterns that must be corrected in order to follow your true calling.

Every challenge provides the chance to respond in a new way, as if your Soul is saying: “Choose again, not as you have in the past.”

Wisdom from A Course in Miracles

Written by Barbara Huson

It’s been said that you’re never given a wish without the power to make it come true.

But how many times have you wished for more—more success, more money, more love, more __________(fill in the blank), and nothing happened, no matter what you did?

That powerless feeling is one of life’s greatest frustrations. I know!

Years ago, right after my divorce, my ex left the country, leaving me with no money in the bank and over a million dollars in tax bills. I knew nothing about finances. He handled everything.

The tax bills were looming and with 3 young daughters to support, I knew I needed to get smart…and fast. I was desperate.

I’m an intelligent woman—how hard could it be? But no matter how many books I read, classes I took, advisors I talked to, my eyes would glaze over, my brain would fog up and I’d feel hopelessly, incurably stupid.

A Spiritual Approach for Scary Times

Written by Barbara Huson

I’ve been turning to A Course in Miracles a lot more these days. I may not be able to control current events, but, as the Course constantly reminds me, I can train my mind to control how I react to them.

This teaching has come in quite handy during the pandemic. Miraculously, in the midst of all the madness, I’ve managed to find serenity.

“Your ability to redirect your thinking,” the Course exclaims, “is the most powerful device that was ever given you for change.”

The ability to redirect your thinking is based on what the Course calls “the most important concept that exists in the universe:” The Law of Cause and Effect. The Course explains this law very differently from the world’s Newtonian version.

To the world, a cause is an external incident which produces an internal effect. The market crashes (cause) and you panic (effect). Your boss complains (cause) and you get upset (effect).

When You Encounter an Obstacle, Don’t Forget to Say Thank You!

Written by Barbara Huson

In my book Sacred Success, I issue a warning: When you commit to Greatness, everything unlike itself will come up to be healed. Life gets in the way. Obstacles arise. Shit happens. Breakdowns occur.

To the masses, obstacles are like ticking time bombs, something to quickly defuse or avoid altogether.

But for those pursuing Greatness, obstacles are doorways to healing and growth. What seems to get in the way is the way to transformation.

“Trials are but lessons that you failed to learn presented once again.” A Course in Miracles tells us, “So where you made a faulty choice before you can now make a better one and thus escape all pain that what you chose before has brought you.”

Difficulties are not diversions from Greatness but proof of dysfunctional patterns that are, thankfully, being brought into awareness so you can correct them. These patterns are precisely what’s been preventing you from achieving Greatness.

Practicing Radical Self-Acceptance

Written by Barbara Huson

All my life, I’ve been a self-improvement junkie. Show me a seminar touting personal growth and it was like throwing raw meat to a ravenous lion. I’d hungrily pounce on it.

But then life went into lockdown, removing a myriad of distractions. That’s when I noticed something disturbing—how brutally critical I am of me. This wasn’t a new insight, of course, but I began to see how awful it felt.

So, I made a conscious decision. Rather than pushing myself to improve, I decided to practice Radical Self-Acceptance, loving myself, warts and all…especially the warts.

Don’t get me wrong. I still aspire to be better. But I’m finding a remarkable sense of freedom and well-being as I learn to fully embrace my shortcomings and my strengths, my achievements and my failures, without fear or false humility, without shame or recrimination.

A Course in Miracles

My “Ambitious” Challenge for 2024. Want to Join Me?

The Subtle Art of Self -Sabotage

The 3 Questions—For Anyone Facing a Perplexing Challenge

Power-From-Within

Shifting from Financial Misery to Financial Miracles in 3 Steps

Those Ticking Time Bombs

Wisdom from A Course in Miracles

A Spiritual Approach for Scary Times

When You Encounter an Obstacle, Don’t Forget to Say Thank You!

Practicing Radical Self-Acceptance

Meet Barbara Huson

Recent Blog Posts