As has been discussed countless times before, if you treat SR like "money" then you'll start to understand it a little more. Take for an example an incident involving one car being rear ended by another, damaging both cars and ruining both drivers races, both will lose SR and one will be more at "fault" then the other.
If treated like money (and real racing) regardless of who is at fault, both of you will need to pay to "fix" it, if somebody rips my bumper off in a real race, chances are I'm still going to be the one who will actually have to pay to fix it, I think SR works the same way. Focusing solely on maintaining your SR will make you slow and perhaps over cautious, if you're able to be aware of your surroundings and drive well without flinging the car off track in every turn then you'll be fine. What
@Punknoodle is experiencing is something everyone of us has, since I've become more accustomed to iRacing, I've rarely had any race ending contact or incidents.