My entire life in a box.. GONE!

Have you experienced losing data, or rather the vehicle the data is kept on? Perhaps you have been through the lesson of 'backing up' your important records. Or not, yet.

Here's my tale...

A little over a week ago, I traveled from Spain, to London, to Singapore, to Perth on a very looooong journey.

Throughout the duration of the journey I used my laptop many times. I also used my USB thumb drives, which contain ALL of my life on digital record. I kept these several thumb drives in an ugly green vinyl pencil case. That is, it was my strategy to make it look uninteresting and unimportant to a potential 'theif' whilst traveling.

I'm usually super vigilant in knowing where my 'pencil case' is kept at all times. On my journey, I made a critical mistake.

I used my thumb drives, then in a dim moment of poor decision, rested my pencil case upon my hand luggage and jacket within the onboard baggage hold above my seat in business class. Instead of immediately tucking it away in my bag. This was on my travel leg from London to Singapore.

The flight had been delayed. Whilst uneventful during the journey, the landing had me in a scrap to get my gear and bolt for the next gate as my connection flight boarded within 25 minutes of us landing in Singapore.

Moving forward in time now...

Four days after returning to Perth, and finally comprehending life through the hazy veil of jet-lag (the worst I have ever experienced in all my travels)... I finally go to 'work' to create even more magic with my ideas.

Because, I hadn't even unpacked my bags yet, including my on-board bag, I went searching for the 'Golden green bag'...

Imagine my face... then... I went pale, I gagged, I coughed, I gulped, I ..I ...I ..I.. *breeeeeeeeeathe*

My brain snapped into 'fix it' mode.. no time for emotion.

I believe EVERYTHING happens for a reason... and trust me, in that moment, I really had to stay conscious with this belief...

This was Thursday 24th September at 10 pm .... all business calls closed.

Aaaarrrrgh!

I tossed and turned in my sleep. My meditation practice rippled with my head in the way, wanting to control the situation. My spirit's voice drowned in the ego muffling it's criticism...and fear.

The next morning, I called the Qantas baggage claim in Singapore. A woman, with a very clipped attitude responded to my call. "We'll get back to you later today, after we have dealt with an emergency. A plane has been diverted back from Kuala Lumpur, and that is our priority."

"Ok," I replied with patience, and trust.

She never got back to me.

Now, I faced a whole weekend of silence, or rather, a head filled of worry...now with baggage claim hours now closed until Monday.

*breathe*

And.. my first action: change all passwords to all accounts. Lock down all security.

*breathe*

I focused my attention on trusting it is possible to have the thumb drives back. I also focused on the gifts included IF I didn't get the thumb drives back. Whilst I had to dig, I found many.

Then, the realization HIT me!

... I remembered, I have ALL of my book manuscript for my latest adventures, stored on those thumb drives. The 'back-ups' were also in the same pencil case. I don't even have 'hard copy' back-ups of all the work I had done.

This is when I allowed myself, to have a fleeting, momentary cry....for about 20 minutes.

Then, I gathered my spirit and realised... "Wait! I'm a Manifestation Queen! They'll be delivered back to me. And, in the meantime, the gift is, your book is real life experience and not a fantasy novel you need to remember. Now, you have the opportunity to start fresh."

I listened to this inner voice, with a little reservation. It was still a hard 'blow'. But I get it. I get that, sometimes we don't always know the reason behind what happens. Sometimes, we find out straight away (we get the lesson)..sometimes, later. Sometimes, not in this life-time.

So, moving forward. Now it is Wednesday 30th September.

I have taken every action conceivable (in my knowledge) to pursue my 'Golden green pencil case', and more importantly the content within: all airport baggage claims (Singapore, Perth, Melbourne and Sydney (remember, I changed planes, and the London to Singapore carried through to Melbourne).. have denied seeing such an item. I must say, every Australian baggage claim consultant were extraordinary in their service to look for it!

My intuition says, the 'Golden green pencil case' is still humbly lying in the depth of the on-board baggage hold.

The lady I spoke to in Melbourne says this is NOT possible. ....of course not. I imagine that would demonstrate a serious breach for on-board security.

Well.. the ending to this tale (so far) is, *deep sigh* an extra awareness of creating back-up in multiple strategies, especially when you travel.

I now have some LARGER external hard-drives (and the LaCie is my favorite for it's travel hardiness).. and I am also staying focused on the opportunity to create a newer, better version of my Adventure to share in book form... especially with the extra experience, love and adventure to add from these last three months touring Europe.

I am also now creating extra, extra, extra back-ups!