Lesson No 1: back up data more often... I have an external hard drive but it's a bit bulky and a bit of a pain so I don't do it as often as I should - the last back up was 2 months ago, before a major overhaul of all my client's programmes with this really cool Excel tool that took me bloody ages to create... I also spent the whole of the day before doing my accounts which I have now lost - luckily the last lot were pre-back-up!
Lesson No 2: Don't leave water bottles unopened near laptops. In fact, there's one right by my lap top as I write this, I clearly have my work cut out for me on this one...
As soon as it happened I took it to the Tech Guys at PC World and at first they thought they could salvage the data so I was a little encouraged - as I was desperate to replace my annoying, slow lap top anyway! As much as it was an expense I could do without so soon after spending £600 on my van and just before spending £500 on kitesurfing equipment, it was nonetheless a cost I would need to incur at some point, and in fact, the time spent wasted on my slow lap top would mean it was kinda saving money to spend it sooner!
It turned out that they couldn't save it, however, so my precious data was lost forever! More stressful was the amount of precious time I had lost, due to wasted effort and the effort now needed to re-do everything I had lost!
But then I wandered over to the Mac section - it is in fact one of my Magic Hundred goals to get a Mac, so this incident had actually made this dream a closer reality! If I had not killed my old lap top I would have not been able to justify the expense of a new one, especially as my 30th is coming up and it would have probably been a present from a few of my family. But my birthday is AFTER the Magic Hundred is over! So if I waited to receive one as a gift I'd be failing on that goal!
When I saw that they were selling a £1200 Mac Book Pro for £850 I just couldn't keep my eyes off it! Although I couldn't really afford it, I realised this was too good to miss, so after some discussion with my boyfriend I went ahead and got it. And suddenly the loss of time, data and money was immaterial! The Mac takes a bit of getting used to, and I have to fork out for the Mac version of Office, but I love it so much! It works and can handle the work I am doing on it, doesn't go into meltdown when I have multiple tabs open and has a load of cool creative stuff, meaning the YouTube vids I need to get round to creating will be all the better (and easier).
You will think I am really sad now, but the worst thing was that I lost all my Fit Day data! I've been logging my food intake since Jan and for some reason even though I had backed up 2 months ago it seemed to lose everything from Feb! Really annoying - but even more annoying is that Fit Day is not Mac compatible!
However, I discovered CalorieKing.com which costs a bit more (which is probably why I didn't get it first time round as I didn't know if the logging would stick) but as I know how lost I felt without FitDay I realised I'll be logging my food for a long time to come so it was worth it - and again, it has been a blessing in disguise as I love it even more! It allows you to copy entire days easily and as I tend to eat similar things on a regular basis this will save me a lot of time. The look and feel is nicer too, and fits with the Mac better, whereas FitDay feels more Excel-ly.
So why have I told you all about this? Well, really just to say that the obstacles in our path are only obstacles if we perceive them to be. We have the choice to deal with situations in any way - I chose in this case to make it as productive as possible and not dwell on what I had lost.
In fact, I've treated it like a fresh start - there was a lot of junk on my old lap top and it really felt like a forced 'de-clutter' and it has made me feel lighter and less bogged down!
Sometimes we need to let go of things, especially the past, and take steps forward into the relative unknown. Just because we have always had cereal and toast for breakfast, it feels safe. The idea of 'losing' that safety net and moving forward can actually be a lot more scary to us on a subconscious level than we might appreciate.
If we look at life as a series of opportunities, rather than of obstacles, we will achieve so much more and enjoy life so much more!
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment