Bad luck isn't just a streak of missed buses or spilled coffee. Sometimes, it’s a cosmic-level sequence of disasters that seems almost scripted by a cruel author. We’ve all had those days where everything goes sideways, but when you look at history, some people have endured tales of unfortunate events so statistically improbable they make you wonder if the universe actually has a sense of humor. A dark one.
Real life is messy.
People often think "unfortunate events" are just about Lemony Snicket books or gothic fiction, but the reality is much weirder. Take the case of Violet Jessop. She was a nurse and ocean liner stewardess who survived the sinking of the Titanic. That’s a miracle, right? Except she was also on the Olympic when it collided with a British warship, and she was later on the Britannic when it hit a deep-sea mine and went down. She survived all three. Some call her "Miss Unsinkable," but you have to wonder about the people who saw her boarding their ship and decided to take a later flight.
The Science of Why We Can’t Look Away
Psychologically, we are wired to pay attention to disaster. It’s a survival mechanism called negativity bias. Our ancestors who ignored the "unfortunate event" of a rustling bush (which turned out to be a tiger) didn’t live long enough to become our ancestors.
But today? We aren't dodging tigers. We’re scrolling through news feeds.
When we read about someone else's catastrophic luck, our brains do something interesting. We experience a mix of empathy and a very specific relief that it isn't us. Researchers at the University of Würzburg have actually studied this—it’s closely tied to the concept of schadenfreude, but it’s less about being mean and more about social comparison. We use these stories to gauge our own safety. If someone else survived a series of tales of unfortunate events, it gives us a weird, subconscious roadmap for how we might handle our own smaller crises.
It's basically a mental dress rehearsal for when things go wrong.
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Historical Realities vs. Fiction
Most people associate this phrase with the fictional Baudelaire orphans. While Daniel Handler’s books are iconic for their "miserabilist" tone, they actually draw heavily on Victorian literary tropes. The idea of the "unfortunate orphan" is as old as Charles Dickens.
However, real-life history is often far more punishing.
Consider Roy Sullivan. He’s the Virginia park ranger who holds the Guinness World Record for being struck by lightning. Not once. Not twice. Seven times. Between 1942 and 1977, Sullivan was hit while in a lookout tower, in his truck, at a ranger station, and even while fishing. He lost eyebrows, toe nails, and had his hair set on fire multiple times. He even claimed he had to fight off a bear with a stick right after one of the strikes. If you wrote that in a novel, an editor would tell you to tone it down because it’s "unrealistic."
That’s the thing about actual tales of unfortunate events: they don’t care about narrative structure. They don't have to make sense.
The Financial Cascades of 2008
Unfortunate events aren't always personal or physical; sometimes they're systemic. Look at the collapse of Lehman Brothers. It wasn't just one bad day. It was a domino effect of subprime mortgages, credit default swaps, and a sudden freeze in the repo markets. For thousands of employees, this was a collective tragedy. They showed up to work on a Monday and were walking out with cardboard boxes by noon.
Business history is littered with these "perfect storms."
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- Kodak failing to pivot to digital (despite inventing the tech).
- Blockbuster turning down the chance to buy Netflix for $50 million.
- The New Coke launch of 1985.
These weren't just "mistakes." They were sequences of bad timing, internal politics, and external market shifts that created a narrative of downfall that people still study in MBA programs today.
Misconceptions About Luck and Probability
We love to blame "luck," but mathematicians have a different take. The Law of Truly Large Numbers basically says that with a large enough sample size, even the most outrageous coincidences are likely to happen. If you have 8 billion people on Earth, someone is going to get hit by lightning seven times.
We try to find patterns where there aren't any.
Kinda like how people think the "Curse of the Pharaohs" was a supernatural tale of unfortunate events. When Howard Carter opened Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922, the media went wild with stories of people dying shortly after. In reality, Carter himself lived another 17 years. Most of the people involved lived to a ripe old age. The "curse" was largely a creation of newspapers looking to sell copies, proving that we’ve been obsessed with "doom-scrolling" for over a century.
Honestly, the real misfortune is usually just poor planning or bad timing, but "The Curse" sounds way more interesting at a dinner party.
How to Build Resilience Against the Unexpected
So, what do you actually do when you’re in the middle of your own tales of unfortunate events? You can’t control the lightning, but you can control the lightning rod.
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Resilience isn't about being "tough" in a cinematic way. It’s about cognitive flexibility. Dr. Lucy Hone, a resilience expert, talks about how resilient people don't diminish their suffering, but they also don't let it become their entire identity. They ask, "Is what I'm doing helping or harming me?"
If you're stuck in a loop of bad news, the first step is recognizing that "unfortunate" is a label, not a permanent state.
Practical Steps for Damage Control
- Audit the "Controllables": When everything goes wrong, grab a piece of paper. Split it down the middle. On one side, write what you can change (your reaction, your next phone call, your budget). On the other, write what you can't (the weather, the stock market, your ex). Stop spending energy on the right side of the page.
- The 10-10-10 Rule: Ask yourself: Will this unfortunate event matter in 10 minutes? 10 months? 10 years? Most things that feel like a disaster today don't even make the "10-month" cut.
- Diversify Your "Life Portfolio": Don't let your self-worth sit in one basket. If your job is your only source of identity and you lose it, that’s a catastrophe. If your job is just one of five things you care about (hobbies, family, community), it's just a setback.
- Study Precedent: Read biographies. Not the "how to be a billionaire" ones, but the ones about people who lost everything and started over. Maya Angelou, Abraham Lincoln, Walt Disney—their lives were basically long-running tales of unfortunate events until they weren't.
Bad things happen. Usually in clusters.
But history shows that the "unfortunate" part is rarely the end of the story unless we decide to stop writing. Whether it's a shipwreck, a lightning strike, or a bad business deal, the human capacity to survive the statistically impossible is actually our most consistent trait. You've probably survived 100% of your worst days so far. That’s a pretty good track record.
Start by looking at your current situation through a clinical lens rather than an emotional one. Identify one single, small action that moves the needle forward by 1%. Maybe it’s an email, a workout, or just cleaning your desk. Momentum is the only known cure for a streak of bad luck.