It was in the context of the Occupy Wall Street movement, in 2011, when I was first made aware of the concept of time banking. I don’t remember precisely how it was presented, but I do remember being intrigued. Despite my interest, though, life had other plans and doing more research on the subject fell farther down the to-do list until it wasn’t there at all. I’d forgotten about it, and my intentions to follow up, entirely.
Fortunately, time banking was not destined to remain in the dust-bins of my good intentions, and I owe a big thanks to the Play the LA River project and the myLA2050 campaign. A recent series of links and clicks, originating with Play’s facebook post to vote for their bid in the myLA contest, led to my reintroduction to my own local time bank: the Arroyo SECO Time Bank! Thanks to that internet rabbit hole, I recently attended the new member orientation at the Silverlake Library, thus finally beginning my immersion into a parallel economy.
As I began this journey through time banking, I realized that there may be others out there who, like me, are interested in knowing more about this concept, and about whether these fascinating theories can be applied in the real world. One of the key tenets is the idea of abundance and sharing, and so, with that in mind, this blog is my attempt to share my experiences in time banking with the wider world.
