There's a difference between having nerves and being nervous. One means you care. The other means you didn't prepare.

In this episode of Shark Theory, Baylor pulls back the curtain on building a brand-new keynote from scratch and the psychology behind performance pressure.

Unlike refining a talk over months like a comedian workshops material, this time Baylor had to deliver something completely new. New stories. New structure. New neuroscience. And with that came something he doesn't often feel: nerves.

But here's the distinction that changed everything.

Nerves simply mean you care. Nervousness usually means you're unprepared.

Baylor breaks down why preparation is the one variable you can always control. Countless hours rewriting, rehearsing, scrapping sections, and refining flow removed the fear of being exposed when the lights came on. Because when you've done the work, the stage doesn't intimidate you. It reveals you.

He also revisits a concept from his earlier work: in life, you only truly fail about 25% of the time. Why? Because outcomes split into two categories: effort failure and experience failure.

Experience failure means you did your best and came up short. That's not failure. That's data. That's growth. That's the Olympic sprinter finishing fourth in the fastest race ever run and walking away with insight, not defeat.

Effort failure, however, is different. That's when you didn't prepare. Didn't practice. Didn't rest. Didn't train. That's the only category you fully control.

Most people don't rise to the occasion. They sink to the level of their training.

So the real question isn't whether you're nervous. It's whether you've done the work before the lights come on.

• The difference between nerves and nervousness

• Why preparation eliminates fear

• The two types of failure and how to tell them apart

• Why experience failure is actually growth

• How effort failure is the only one you control

• Why you don't rise to the occasion, you sink to your training

"Nerves mean you care. Nervous means you didn't prepare."

Before you explode, ask yourself one question: What am I actually mad at?

In this episode of Shark Theory, Baylor shares a frustrating piano lesson that almost ended with a keyboard through the wall and the powerful insight that came from it.

While trying to master a section of the James Bond theme, he hit a wall. Repeated mistakes. Rising frustration. Boiling anger. The kind that makes you want to quit.

But instead of staying in that emotion, he paused and asked a deeper question: What is the real source of this frustration?

From that moment, two powerful categories emerged.

First, frustration rooted in negative patterns. Toxic jobs. Toxic relationships. Repetitive situations you knowingly stay in. In those cases, the frustration may not be about what happened. It may be about the fact that you keep allowing yourself to stand in something you know won't change. That's a hard truth, but owning it is the fastest way to break the cycle.

Second, frustration rooted in growth.

In Baylor's case, the keyboard wasn't the enemy. The frustration existed because he cared. He was advancing quickly. He was attempting something above his level. The tension wasn't failure. It was expansion.

There's a big difference between frustration caused by toxicity and frustration caused by progress. One drains you. The other stretches you.

Once you identify which category you're in, everything shifts. Negative frustration requires removal. Growth frustration requires perspective.

Sometimes the anger isn't a signal to quit. It's proof that what you're doing matters.

• Why you must identify the true source of frustration

• The difference between toxic patterns and growth pains

• How staying in negative cycles fuels anger

• Why caring deeply creates intense emotion

• How reframing frustration lowers stress and restores focus

• When to walk away and when to lean in

"Some frustration means you need to leave. Other frustration means you're growing. Know the difference."

You say certain things make you happy. But what does happiness actually feel like to you?

In this episode of Shark Theory, Baylor shares a powerful question from a recent therapy session that completely shifted his perspective: What does happiness feel like?

Not what makes you happy. Not what you're doing when you're happy. But what does it feel like?

At first, Baylor listed activities. Walking his dog. Playing golf. Spending time with friends. But his therapist pressed further. Feelings aren't events. They're states.

That distinction changes everything.

Too often, people tie happiness to specific moments, roles, or achievements. Athletes tie it to performance. Professionals tie it to promotions. Parents tie it to milestones. When those events disappear or slow down, so does their perceived happiness.

But when Baylor dug deeper, he realized happiness for him wasn't about the activity. It was the feeling of emptiness of thought. A quiet mind. No overthinking. No mental clutter. Just presence.

That realization unlocked something important. If happiness is a state of mind, not a specific event, then you can experience it in far more places than you thought. It also means you can reverse engineer it.

When you understand what happiness feels like, you can identify its opposite. For Baylor, stress and anxiety show up as mental overload. Too many thoughts. Too much noise. Too much energy wasted on things that don't matter.

The lesson is simple but profound: you can't move toward something if you don't know what it feels like. Once you define your emotional state clearly, you can deliberately design your life around creating more of it.

• Why tying happiness to events limits your joy

• The difference between actions and emotional states

• How identity and roles can distort your sense of fulfillment

• Why defining the feeling of happiness matters

• How to reverse engineer your emotional state

• How awareness reduces anxiety and mental overload

"Happiness isn't what you're doing. It's the state your mind is in while you're doing it."