Although this article is focused on a detailed overview of the foundation, I understand it can be helpful to personalise an organisation somewhat, rather than it just existing as a “faceless entity”, so to speak.

I’m Louis Allport, the founder of ForwardView Foundation, and I live in the UK near London.

I became a “seeker” (looking for larger answers) in my teens.  This led me to books like Autobiography of a Yogi and Daughter of Fire.  It also led me to interest in Buddhism, and organisations like Self Realization Fellowship.

Through this interest, I started meditating in my teens, although (to date) it hasn’t been something I’ve been consistent with.  Hopefully that will resolve itself at some point in the future.

Focus on such things receded into the background for a few years, but was still there.  Then in my mid-twenties I discovered Tony Parsons, attended his meetings in London, and have been regularly attending non-duality discussions ever since.

I had a reaction to one meeting of Roger Linden’s, around the age of thirty.  The way I describe it is the ability to push things to the back of my mind had been turned off.  This isn’t strictly accurate, but it gives an idea.  And this was an uncomfortable time and I didn’t feel very supported at all regarding what was happening, so looked for more understanding and answers about this.

I’ve since discovered that meetings, meditation… can cause an opening up process, and things you’ve tucked away can start to reappear, to be dealt with.  This may not happen for everyone, but I’ve heard of this happening for different people in different ways.

Some find it easy to deal with.  I didn’t.  I started meditating again to ease things somewhat, and that did help.  Audio Dharma was a wonderfully helpful website during this period.  But I then discovered the Release Technique and found it particularly useful at that time.

Learning and really getting used to this technique was a very, very incremental process for me, that took years.   Perhaps I’m a slow learner.  Some certainly do learn and benefit from it much faster than I did.  But it did help me start to deal with what was happening.

During this I took time away from meetings, until I felt comfortable to rejoin them again.

After quite a few years of releasing alongside going to meetings, strangely enough the Release Technique fell away for me.  Doing it started to feel quite contracted.  And that too seems to be a common occurrence – something that helps you at a certain point along your journey, falls away when it’s no longer needed.  Or when the time has come for something new (although it may not immediately be clear what the next step is, which can result in some confusion I’ve found).

Going to meetings continued, but there was still very much an interest in releasing.  But I was trying to understand how to implement that approach again, when structured techniques like the Release Technique no longer worked.

I then discovered Jim Eaton, and in time Louise Kay, who make releasing part of their meetings.  Although ultimately, those meetings aim to help you be able to sit quietly by yourself outside of a meeting, sink into meditation, and release naturally on a very deep level.

And frankly, the goal of all these meetings and approaches is for you to become your own “teacher”, so to speak, as your true answers are inside and always have been.  But along the way, meetings and support can certainly be helpful, until they may no longer be needed for you.

It’s this whole journey that started in my teens, took a major turn around 30, and that has continued since then, that led me to the decision to start the foundation.  As an attempt to bring together non-duality discussions, releasing, and meditation, as I feel they work very well together.

I can’t remember exactly when the idea came of attempting to make this as accessible as possible (entirely free) as widely as possible.  Perhaps around 2013, but it can be difficult to pinpoint exactly when an idea is born, and especially exactly where it came from.

At that time I didn’t have much money at all, and one motivating factor for the foundation was seeing high priced retreats, and thinking that they were unnecessarily expensive, and that if you really want to help people, you make things as affordable as possible.  I’m well aware that people have to make a living, but I also feel it’s healthiest if there’s a balance between earning a living, and helping people.  And this foundation is an attempt to help to balance things entirely towards helping people, without asking for anything financial in return.

And back then, online events were rare, so there was always travel involved.  I generally had to travel to London by train (plus underground, plus walking), which was two or three hours each way, which isn’t a particularly relaxing way to attend a meeting.  Plus, getting home around 1am in the middle of the week isn’t ideal.  And I even used to travel to London for one-to-one (private) sessions.  And trying to settle into a one hour private session, after two or more hours of travelling, isn’t exactly ideal either.

The pandemic made online events so much more common.  And online events have been a real blessing for me, and hopefully for others too.  It allows me to attend many more, and a much wider variety of events, than I otherwise could.  It also costs less (no travel…etc.) and there’s no lost income as I can attend online events around work.  I wasn’t sure online events would really work as I had been so used to in-person events, but now I absolutely love them.  And that’s why nearly all events the foundation runs in-person will also be available to attend remotely.

So after a few years of thinking about it, and quite a bit of research, the foundation was formed in 2016.  And things have moved forward from there, albeit slowly.