I care too much. This is a fact.

In particular, I care too much about the art of building software.

As time goes on, software continues to become an increasingly present and critical element in our world. I take my job as a software practitioner incredibly seriously, as I believe it is my ethical responsibility to do so. As a result, I care deeply about things like technical excellence, code quality and maintainability, and treating code with the same importance as the end deliverable.

This care does not come without cost. On the contrary, the cost of caring is enormously high. I routinely suffer from high levels of stress and anxiety as a result of my caring about a particular matter. I am especially inundated with these adverse effects when I'm surrounded by people who don't care as much as I do.

Would it be healthier for me to not care so much? Almost certainly. At the very least it may slow the rate at which gray hairs are appearing on my head.

But, for me, not caring is not an option. I have the choice between caring too much or becoming entirely apathetic. There is no in-between. Presented with these two extremes, I would choose caring every single time.

Not caring is lazy. It takes work to care. There is a high cost to caring, but it is absolutely worth it.