I almost lost access to my password manager this morning.
And it terrified me.
For years I’ve maintained complex, randomised passwords for all my online accounts in Lastpass. They’re protected behind a master password and 2-factor authentication.
What I didn’t realise was my master password had became part of my muscle memory—much similar to the 6 digits we use to access our phones.
So today, when I paused and thought about the password—the specific letters and digits—I blanked.
I tried multiple times, attempted to reset, used Face ID to see if that made a difference, was temporarily suspended from logging in, and finally tried to contact Lastpass’ customer service, but nothing worked.
And given this is a password vault, it has the odd quirk of being completely inaccessible if the recovery methods don’t work.
Don’t worry though, I eventually regained access, but only through an unlikely method. After trying all of the obvious online methods, I sat down with a pen and paper and started to write the possible combinations and variations of my master password.
And finally, it clicked.
A few lessons from my morning:
- Carefully judge when it’s safe to rely on muscle memory. Some things are too important to be complacent about.
- Sometimes the advanced, automated approach can’t beat the basics
- There is still a lot of power in the paper and pen