My 13 Year Journey with Archery
I wanted to share my journey with archery. It has changed drastically over the past 13 years.
This is me with my very first bow, a Browning Compound.
2003: I had always been interested in archery but never really thought much of it, so when I saw that my college offered an archery class, I jumped on it. Cause hey, why not? The class taught traditional archery using recurve bows. I fell in love on the first day. I was always so ecstatic to go to archery class. We learned so much and it really taught me the very basics of archery.
The weekend after the class ended, I went to the local archery shop and told them I wanted a bow of my very own. I got fully setup with a Browning compound bow. I loved that bow.
I practiced shooting at hay bails on my mothers land as often as I could. I didn’t get a bow so that I could hunt. I didn’t get it so I could compete. I didn’t get it for any particular reason other than I loved archery and just wanted to shoot a bow. It was all just for fun.
2004: I got a job at a summer camp teaching kids how to shoot archery. It was one of the best jobs I have ever had. Extremely rewarding and a lot of fun.
This is me with some of my students at the summer camp teaching archery. I’m in the white jacket in the very front. Loved these kids!
2005: Some personal things happened in my life and I stopped shooting my bow. The need to shoot wasn’t really present for a long time as life really beat me down for a while.
2007: A moving company lost my Browning bow. I cried. A lot. I didn’t get a new bow until…
2012:Â At the time, I had a job at Bass Pro Shops where I worked in the archery section. Bass Pro has their own brand of bow which is made by Diamond. I had been eyeing the bows for a long time, knowing that I wanted a new bow. I got a 40% discount on the Bass Pro brand bow! That was huge. My husband wanted a bow, too, wanted to learn archery. So we did a bow exchange for Christmas. He and I both got new bows and I began shooting immediately in our backyard. I taught my husband how to shoot his bow and he shot a lot with me. My love for archery had been reborn.
Though I still shot just for fun with no particular purpose in mind. My husband and I shot our bows as often as we could, though we didn’t shoot them all that often. It was a hobby, something we did for fun. Until…
2014: My long-lost friend from Oregon suddenly moved down to Texas! She had married a Texas boy, just like me. She had moved down to Texas, just like me. She was in archery, guns, hunting…just like me. We are a couple years apart in age, but we lived in the same cul-de-sac for many, many years when we were kids and were very close up until about high school where we lost touch.
Anyway, she had a bow, I had a bow, so we decided to get together and sling some arrows on her property.
I was still just shooting for fun, right up until…
2015: I am very tuned into the outdoors industry and all the goings-ons. At the ATA show in 2015, Bowtech released the Eva Shockey edition compound bow. I had to have that bow. I don’t know what it was, I just had to have it!
A month later after the announcement at ATA, I had the Eva Shockey bow in my hands.
For the rest of 2015, I started really shooting my bow more than I had ever shot in my entire life. I was starting to get more serious about my aiming, exactly how I shot, everything. I had been shooting for so long that I had created a lot of bad habits for myself because I always just shot for fun, not for results. But the more I shot, the more I realized that I wanted to see results! I wanted to see tight groupings, I wanted my arrows to actually hit where I told them to hit. I was all over the place!
So I did just that. Between 2015 and present day (2016), I have been fixing my bad habits, been getting more precise with my shots and overall feeling more confident in my shooting. I have a purpose now with my archery and it has definitely made me a much better archer.
A photo posted by MorganRogue (@morganrogue) on
The archery goals that I have for 2016 and beyond are:
- Get involved in 3-D archery competitions
- Bow hunt
- Bow fish
I am focused on really pursuing MORE with my archery. I have many goals and I plan to achieve each and everyone of them.
I’d love to hear your journey with archery!
You may also like
Howdy! My name is Morgan I’ve been prepping for over 10 years and teach others to be prepared for emergencies and disasters. Learn more!
