Finding Center Through Traditional Archery

I shot bows as a kid. Loved it. Then I discovered girls and that was that. Always said I would get back into it. Took me about 20 years.

This past year, something clicked. I decided to lean into traditional archery because it felt more honest. No sights. No compounds. No tree stands. Just me, a traditional longbow, and whatever woodsmanship skills I can develop. The hard way, like Howard Hill used to talk about.

I live in the mid-Atlantic. Whitetail deer are our best hunt. I use public lands. I make my own wooden arrows. I burn my own fletchings. I do my own cresting. I hope to forge my own arrowheads someday (that is called arrowsmithing, by the way. Making arrows is fletching. Bowyers make bows).

I became obsessed.

The Tech Guy Who Hates Devices

People know me for tech work. AI agents. Coordination systems. Cadderly. Peake.ai. Shipping production code as an army of one. Teaching at art colleges. Building Virgent AI into something real.

Truth is, I spend as much time away from devices as possible.

I have been a triathlete. Active yogi for years. I hike with my three dogs nearly every day and have for a long time. But this year was different. Something shifted. I started craving camping again. Planning ultra marathons. Training for adventures. Wanting to head out into public land for 10 days with ultralight gear, set up a base camp, and just hunt. Just be part of the land.

I found ways to accelerate my interaction with devices using transcriptions and AI tools I built myself. That freed up time. Time to get outside. Time to learn woodsmanship. Time to pay attention to tree types, their wood, their leaves, their bark. Time to study tracks and terrain.

I started searching for arrowheads when I walk our creeks. I joined Reddit communities (have not done that in forever) and fell in love with r/bowyer, r/TradBowhunting, and r/TraditionalArchery.

Clay Hayes and the Classics

I became a student again. Clay Hayes topped my YouTube watch time this year (top 0.1% of his audience). I devoured his books and the classics. The Witchery of Archery by Maurice Thompson. Hunting with the Bow and Arrow (1923) by Saxton Pope, where I learned about Ishi again. The Archer's Bible (1968) by Fred Bear. Real knowledge from people who hunted with traditional gear when that was the only option.

The Bowyer's Bible series sits on my shelf now. I reference it constantly. These books teach you how to select wood, understand grain, read the natural properties of materials. This is craftsmanship that goes back thousands of years.

I love learning this stuff. I love that I have so much more to learn.

What Changed

I stopped smoking weed. Stopped drinking. Stopped the panic to become the next great technocrat and just started loving who I already am.

Archery, fletching, and bowyer work became my passion. Frankly, I cannot wait to just do that when I retire or exit.

I am grateful for my technical skills. The ability to work remote for so many years as an entrepreneur. I am happy I get to spend so much time around my wife, my dogs, and now my newborn son. I love that we live on a little horse farm. I love getting hay round bales, making our own bread, heating the house with a woodstove.

I even sold my Audi and eliminated nearly all of my bills. I stopped wasting money on everything (archery is not cheap, but hey, nobody is perfect). Time finally slowed back down. I no longer feel like life is rushing away from me. Now I am one with it. In my zen. And every day, archery brings me deeper into that meditation.

Building Skills the Old Way

I am building a shaving horse to make my own self bows. Learning stringmaking. Planning to get a home forge to start making my own heads and knives.

I started wearing a lot of merino wool this year (FirstLite makes excellent gear). Started playing with knives again. Got my concealed carry course done. Joined an archery and gun club.

I still love Linux. Still code all the time (nearly every day). Still sell my consulting services through Virgent. Still teach. But a part of me I was rejecting or ignoring has come full bloom. I feel balanced.

Hunting Public Lands

I have not taken a deer yet. I do not know how I will feel when I do.

But I have been out there hunting public lands. I have gotten close. I have stalked them down successfully and even got within range a few times. Nothing yet.

I believe when I do take one, it will be as honorable as it could be. I hope to be one who can provide for my family in a new way. To have a freezer full of self-earned meat using a bow I made, arrows I made, reading the terrain, the wind, the time of day.

Frankly, I just enjoy every part of the journey so far. I look forward to continuing in 2026.

The Balance

This version of me makes sense.

The guy who builds AI coordination agents and also burns his own arrow fletchings. Who ships production code for case studies that save clients real money, and also stalks whitetail through public forest. Who teaches AI courses at art colleges and also studies how to select oak for a self bow.

It is all the same person. I just stopped pretending one part mattered more than the other.

Cameron Hanes talks about keeping hard. Pushing your limits. Testing yourself. That resonates. But for me, the test is not just physical. It is about presence. About paying attention. About doing the work to learn skills that humans have practiced for thousands of years.

I like this version of me. I hope it is here to stay.

What I Hope You Take From This

Find peace in presence. In taking in breath. In daily improvements. In focus, calm, and the ancient ways.

You do not have to choose between building modern technology and learning old crafts. Between shipping AI agents and making wooden arrows. Between coding and woodsmanship.

Balance is not about compromise. It is about integration.

I am still the same person who built Cadderly and ships production agents. I am just also the person who hunts with gear I made myself. Both matter. Both make me better at the other.

Time slows down when you pay attention. When you stop rushing toward some imagined future success and start appreciating what you can do right now.

For me, that meant coming back to archery. For you, it might be something else entirely.

Find it. Lean into it. Stop ignoring the parts of yourself that do not fit your professional identity.

Life is too short to be only one thing.

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Check out Clay Hayes' YouTube channel and books if you are interested in traditional archery and primitive skills. Read the classics like The Bowyer's Bible if you want to learn the craft. Get good gear from FirstLite if you are heading outdoors.

And if you need AI agents or production systems for your business, that is what Virgent AI does. I still love building that stuff. I just also love making arrows now.