I was exactly the same in my earlier dev days! I'd learn about a pattern, think it was the greatest thing since sliced bread, and see uses for it everywhere...

I was exactly the same in my earlier dev days! I'd learn about a pattern, think it was the greatest thing since sliced bread, and see uses for it everywhere... where it really wasn't suitable at all. I was like a builder with only a hammer - everything looked like a nail! I ended up making a lot of things a lot more complex than they needed to be, or/and a lot less performant than they could be. At some point, lot's of people seemed to come to the same realisation - worshipping design patterns is a bad idea. Around this time I first heard about "cargo culting". These days my motto is "no dogma" (well, except about not being dogmatic ;), and I think it serves me well.