29 Jun 2025 2 min read career advice

You Don’t Have to Be Passionate, You Just Need to Give a Damn

If one more tech bro tells you to “find your passion,” feel free to passionately roll your eyes.

Here’s a truth bomb wrapped in a warm hug: you do not need to be passionately obsessed with your job to be great at it. You don’t need to eat, sleep, and breathe code. You don’t need to wake up with IDE dreams and fall asleep to the sweet lullaby of CI/CD pipelines. You just need to care.

That’s it. That’s the tweet. But since this is a blog, let’s break it down.

Passion is Overrated

The tech world glorifies the “passionate developer” archetype like it’s a requirement for success. You know the type, building three side projects, contributing to ten open-source repos, and evangelizing a new JavaScript framework before lunch.

But here’s the secret: a lot of those folks are exhausted. Some are fronting. And many have cycled through burnout so many times, they could lead a seminar on it.

Passion fades. But giving a damn? That’s sustainable.

What It Means to Give a Damn

Giving a damn doesn’t mean burning the candle at both ends. It means showing up, being present, and giving a crap about the work, the people, and the outcome.

It looks like this:

Asking your teammate how they’re doing, and actually listening

Leaving code better than you found it

Documenting your decisions so someone else doesn’t suffer

Saying, “I don’t know, but I’ll figure it out” instead of bullshitting

You don’t have to love every second of the job. But if you give a damn about doing it well and treating people right, you’re already miles ahead.

Drop the Pressure to Be “All In”

Tech culture sells this narrative that unless you’re obsessed, you’re not committed. That’s nonsense. You’re allowed to have a life. You’re allowed to clock out. You’re allowed to like your job without it being your entire identity.

Hell, sometimes the healthiest thing you can do for your work isn’t working on it for a while.

The Best Devs I Know Aren’t Always the Loudest

They’re the quiet ones mentoring juniors. The ones reviewing pull requests at 80% depth but with 100% kindness. The ones asking the dumb questions no one else had the courage to.

They’re not grinding side hustles for clout. They’re not tweeting hot takes for likes. They just care. And it shows.