Sometimes the common denominator is not bad luck.

When the same difficulty keeps recurring across different people, jobs, and cities, chance stops being a satisfying explanation. Something in what you choose, tolerate, or provoke is traveling with you. Recognizing this is not an accusation, and it does not mean any single instance was your doing. It means there is a lever you have not noticed.

List the last few times a familiar problem showed up and look for what those situations shared, especially in what you did at the start. The pattern is usually earlier than you think. Change the entry point rather than trying harder in the middle.