After a study of dozens of successful and failed attempts of baking cookies, it has been confirmed that one ingredient is a must-have for any recipe:

Anxiety

Anxiety is not sold in any stores, you can’t order it from TV or online. The following steps will help you get the coveted anxiety that will guarantee amazingly baked cookies every time.

First, follow your favorite cookie recipe and then:

1. Consider the people for whom you’re making these cookies. What kind of cookies would people want to eat? Chocolate? Or was that anchovies? What if someone is allergic to anchovies?

You just added nuts into the mix, but did you even consider nut allergies, you murderer? Now you have to throw out this mix and start all over.

2. Remember to check and double check that every ingredient that went into the cookie dough is fresh. How can you be sure that expiration date stamped on the egg carton isn’t a lie by the egg corporation that uses eggs from genetically mummified chicken carcasses, which we won’t find out about until the lie is exposed and by then we’ve already eaten hundreds of eggs within our lifetime?

Is that a blood spot on the yolk of the egg you just cracked open into the mix? Now you have to throw out this mix and start all over.

3. Think about how you could get hair into the mix even though you put it up in a pony tail. Maybe you don’t even have long hair, but you’re just sure that some stray hair or goat will come out of nowhere and will get into the cookie dough if you aren’t super, extra careful mixing it.

Imagine all those dead skin flakes, beach balls, and kites floating around in the air at any given second. They’re landing on the cookie dough! Now you have to throw out this mix and start all over.

4. Keep in mind that there’s a possibility that the cookies could come out under-cooked or burnt. If you’ve finally gotten the cookie dough in the oven, what if the oven is too hot? Maybe watching them and poking them with a toothpick every few minutes will help? Toothpicks are sharp, what if it hurts the cookies?

Just in case the cookies get lonely in there, take them out every few minutes, gaze lovingly at them, and give them positive affirmations. If they’re under-cooked, put them back in the oven to bake longer so they can become emotionally mature enough to accept their fate of being mauled and eaten alive. But if they’re burnt, throw out the cookies and start all over.

5. Under NO circumstances should you park your car into the cookies.

If all that fails to give you anxiety, just remember this: Even if you’ve followed the recipe and these steps exactly, it’s still possible that the cookies will turn out shitty.