I think doom is really good for inspiration. I used it for a while and it gave me a lot of good ideas on the kinds of things I could do with emacs and elisp.
I now use my own much simpler config, but I've borrowed heavily from the things I like about Doom.
Yes, this is exactly how I use Doom. When I first found it, I transplanted its startup optimizations into my existing config, but left everything else alone. When I look to do something new in Emacs, one of my first instincts is "well, let's see how Doom is doing it."
It's works well because I fall into the Evil+Use-package Emacs hegemony with my custom config.
I now use my own much simpler config, but I've borrowed heavily from the things I like about Doom.