It happened to me recently. The thing we all fear: your computer screen goes blue, and says it’s shutting down. I actually had one more chance – it started up long enough for my husband to say “you should back up your stuff” and then bam, “all gone!”, as we like to sing to our kids.
As the one who’s responsible for keeping the biz part of Ma Yoga running, this was pretty scary.
I hadn’t backed up since last September and I lost all my contacts and passwords since 2011, but otherwise I was lucky. A lot of our info was on the website and in Dropbox; I’d given forms and manuals to a lot of people who were happy to give them back. I had audios of my lectures so I could re-do my outlines, and my husband was able to recover thousands of unnamed files that I went through and found things things here and there.
So, after a good 24 hours of shock peppered with occasional meditations with my head in my hands (not sure that can be considered meditation but I tried), here’s what I learned without a computer and my usual organizational systems:
1.) Back up your computer. Recognize the value of your time and back up at least monthly, or weekly if you’re on it a lot.
2.) Did you know you can get a really good PC laptop with a touch screen for $220 at Newegg? Not sure what this has to do with yoga so I’m moving on.
3.) Remember what’s important. It’s easy to start thinking that emails and posts are the thing. Of course they’re not the thing. But what about the things that really matter to us?
It wasn’t until I found several of the files I was desperately searching for, and read them, that I realized: they just weren’t all that. In most cases, starting over from where I am now will be a big improvement.
I’m not saying pictures and poems aren’t important. But it’s actually all in you; the outside things are just there to remind you of what’s already waiting for you in this moment.
4.) And: did you know that when you delete files on your computer, they are actually still there? They are simply marked “ignore”.
I’ve been thinking of this as a great metaphor for our body/mind after an intense, difficult experience like birth, or our child getting sick, or many sleepless nights in a row: we think we wiped the residue clean, but we actually still have imprints and remnants in our body and mind that affect our choices and outlook.
How can we really wipe clean? Where is your real reset button? My meditation practice is what I feel helped me to stay relatively clear-headed through it all.
Get thyself a meditation practice.
5.) After taking a close look at my experience, here’s my biggest take away: my systems allow me to feel like I’m in control. When I lost them, I felt out of control. When we feel out of control, we have two choices: we can freak out, or we can remember that we were never in control in the first place.
More to the point, we can realize that we never actually had to have control to be happy, and that – according to yoga – happiness is instead a choice we can make at any time, no matter what is going on. No. Matter. What.
Here’s what’s important to me right now: my 7 year old and I are reading Little House in the Big Woods (and watching some Michael Landon in all of his 70’s dreaminess). We’re all envisioning how our new house will look, and looking at pictures of decks. I am going to a pregnant mama’s house for a yoga and wellness combo session this morning, then I’ll see some moms and babies in class, and then I’ll head to lunch with friends.
I’m not going to say I’m glad this all happened, but I feel grateful for the reminders. As my mentor/friend Julie says – if you’re my student, you’ve heard me say it a million times – if pregnancy doesn’t teach you that you’re not in control, then labor will; if labor doesn’t, then your children will.
And if your children don’t, then our lives will!
So let’s play, let go, and appreciate what we have on and off the mat this week…
