Please read this page to know how to encrypt Mac data with FileVault.
I’d try to see if I could copy over any recent files to a thumb drive, but I doubt I’d be able to recover everything. Besides, there’s another way to protect your data on SSD using FileVault, which is a disk encryption program built-in Mac OS X 10.3 and later. Delete Spaces preferences in the Library folder - then reboot. I do have a Time Machine backup, but it’s from over a month ago, so even if I got “restore from Time Machine backup” to work, I’d likely lose a lot of my recent work. I tried all of the usual suggestions without any success: Forget the WIFI network, remove it from System Preferences - then reboot. I’m not sure what my next step is from here. Interestingly enough, /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/ had a bunch of install metadata, and most of my content was moved to “Recovered Items”. I booted back into recovery again and this time opened the Terminal to see what my drive contents looked like. I tried reinstalling MacOS from Recovery (Mojave), but the same issue occurs - the installer starts but just gets frozen at around “26 minutes remaining”. I even tried booting into Recovery and disk utility said the disk was fine. Another post said to boot into safe mode and try the install, but when holding shift key at startup the MacBook Pro immediately shuts down while the fans make a brief, loud “whoosh”. Several online posts said that the only way to unfreeze was to hold the power button down and force a reboot. I read that the installer freezing is somewhat common (again one of the main reasons I stuck with Mojave is because of Apple’s severe decline in software quality in recent years). Installer started, reboot and about an hour in it just got stuck on “27 minutes remaining…” I let it sit for another few hours but no movement in the progress bar (about 25% complete). Yesterday I bit the bullet and tried to upgrade to Catalina from the App Store. I’m a long time Mac user who has been very happy sticking with Mojave for as long as I could.