Today I got stopped out at level 5 of tptacek and patio11's excellent Jailbreak Challenge.

I am a professional developer in my dayjob, and I am mostly proud of the systems that I've engineered over the years. There have always been large challenges and tight constraints, but the path to solution has always been straightforward, given a little research. There has never been a time in my career as a developer where I've been in an "I can't see any possible way to do this" scenario.

Enter Jailbreak. I have never been more frustrated in my entire life. Nothing but wild goose chases and dead ends. While others sail through the levels with ease, I eventually ended up having to give up entirely at level 5 due to total exhaustion of all available options.

Having eaten my humble pie, my question to HN is: how do I improve at this? Are there fundamental cognitive constraints or modes of thinking that some people like me will simply never be able to push through? Why are solutions so clear and obvious during normal software development whereas these class of problems do little more than frustrate? Am I simply too dumb (or old, at 36, due to brain plasticity)?

What resources are available to improve at this, if any? Ideally I'd like to improve my skills at this and retry level 5 in whatever timeframe (a year?) is expected to become competent at this. Any help or suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks.