Log In Issue, Correct username and password but login prompt comes back

Hi, I've been using Kali on the same VM in Vmware for 6 months or so. It has been running great. All of a sudden I started up the VM. Entered my encryption password. At the login prompt, I entered my username and password and clicked enter. The screen goes black for about 2 seconds and goes back to the login prompt. It does not give me an error for incorrect username or password. Just simply returns to the login screen. I can't seem to figure out any way to log in.

Does anyone know how to fix this? Thanks!

simply returning to the login screen is expected behaviour when the username or password is incorrect.
You need to interupt the initial grub boot;

https://dannyda.com/2020/01/07/how-t...gle-user-mode/