Cooking is just like anything else: it takes a lot of time and dedication to practice. I'm sure you could do it, if you had the time! I tend to make the same recipe over and over, changing little things here and there about how I prepare the food. Eventually you'll recognize the physics of it, because it's all very scientific.
So, you'll realize things that help you out a lot, like if you cook something in the oven, and it comes out looking perfect on the outside, but the inside is still too under-cooked, you would know that the temperature on your oven was too high, and the cooking time too short. To adjust, you could try it again at a lower temperature for extra time.

It's definitely challenging given that every oven and stove top tends to differ, which has an effect on how your pancakes come out, for example. Pancakes are the worst, I still can't get the damn things right. Haha