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| The following is a collection of anecdotes and personal experiences written by people in Subud. ( Note: Every person experiences in Subud is different from one another, these experiences, that are written here, is just some of many experiences that people have with Subud) |
| Ralph Nimmann, Cambridge, UK: A kind of soul connection ... I found my way to the Subud group in September 1997. At my first meeting I sensed a kind of soul connection with some members. Half the group is involved in music, singing and creativity. My first latihan was quite overwhelming and left me flooded in tears. I got a glimpse of complete freedom, which was exciting and scary at the same time. I realised that I do not have to practice a certain mantra, or do special postures; I don't have to do anything at all - I am free! |
| Dea Campbell, Lewes, UK: The veil had been snatched away ... When I came to Subud I had tried lots of different ways to get closer to the spiritual undercurrent I knew was running through my life. It always seemed tantalisingly out of reach. Although I did feel close to the divine source at times, and had done since I was a child, direct experience of the Absolute was patchy, muffled, as if I was trying to feel something subtle and fine but wearing a gas mask and boxing gloves. Also I had a tendency to forget all about my search for God at times, and get caught up in more wordly matters. Nevertheless, something kept pulling me back to try yet again to find my way home. My expectations of Subud were that it would be similar to other things I'd tried ... it would allow me to feel a little bit closer to my higher self for a while, before I slipped back into forgetfulness again when the nights started drawing in! So the first latihan I went to was the most astounding and surprising thing that ever happened to me. It was as if the veil had been snatched away, and I was finally aware of God in me and in everyone around me. It was utterly different from anything I had ever experienced. I was literally moved from within. This continues to happen twice a week on a regular basis, and what amazes me now is that something so miraculous has become almost commonplace. |
| Rasjad Johnson, Australia: Lightness and closeness to God's love ... I joined Subud in 1971 after migrating to Australia from the UK. I heard about Subud from a friend just before leaving in 1970. It all sounded pretty weird to me and I thought no more about it. Then I started feeling dissatisfied with my life and wrote to my friend asking how his experience with Subud had gone. Somewhere in his reply was a single sentence that said Subud works 100%. I was so intrigued that I sought it out for myself. I found the whole concept of my own direct link with God amazing. I was convinced that this was something special and all I'd have to do is leave it all to God. Later, I realised that I have a part to play in the process and I need to also make some effort. After all this time (much longer than I thought in 1971) I am starting to feel a small difference in how I am and act. I am less intense and not so angry so often, and there are moments of lightness and closeness to God's Love. A while ago, I had the opportunity to travel for Subud. It was then that I appreciated just how wide Subud is and how it can encompass all cultures and religions and ways of life, from a Muslim goat farmer in Java to a Christian executive in Sydney. We can all be as one in our worship through the spiritual exercise of Subud. |
| Amalia Inger Holm, Denmark & Indonesia: Subud found me... I did not come to Subud, but Subud found me. One and a half years ago, a dear friend of mine abroad who I had not seen for over ten years, dreamt about me, and contacted me to say that he had to tell me about Subud. What he told me resonated in my heart. I thought this was what I had always been looking for, searching for a spiritual way. Having left the Protestant church very young, I had searched for not only spiritual ways, but ways of action in this life. Six years before I started doing the latihan, I had a kind of vision which I could not forget, and in that vision, I both 'saw' a child and harp falling down from Heaven, and I 'saw' Christ and an Asian man who I could not identify. I painted that, and wondered who he was and what he represented until the day I first saw photos of Bapak, the very first to receive the Subud latihan. I acted on my vision and went to Nicaragua to work with children through music and art. Some years after, Subud came to me. Now I have been doing the latihan for almost a year, and amazing things are happening in my life. In latihan I am gently and sometimes not so gently being relieved of many burdens, both mental and physical, I am being healed from physical weaknesses and sort of 'cleansed inside. For me, Subud is a way to go and there is no going backwards now, wherever this will lead. I am getting help from a source I always knew about and which was always inside of me, but which I had been looking for in the outside, material world. I had a lot of fear. Now the fear is gone. It's a journey in a sometimes unknown land which without the latihan I would not have dared to enter. Now I can go 'where only the angels can walk', and the surprising thing is, it's not so difficult, and I am walking along with many brothers and sisters from all around the world. |
| Rozak Tatebe, Japan: Subud brought me many benefits ... When I was a university student I was given an unexpected spiritual experience and knew that God really exists. This filled me with tremendous joy and gave me a completely new outlook of life. But this uplifted state gradually faded away and I found myself still full of impurities and dirtiness. I earnestly looked for something and encountered Subud. I felt nothing in the first few latihans. Then I had a strong reaction accompanied with a feeling of freedom and the conviction that my soul was being liberated by the working of the Power of God. I have now been in Subud for 46 years. My life in Subud was a journey towards inner transformation, which was sometimes intense and painful, requiring a lot of patience, but it also brought me many benefits like peace, happiness, harmony and spiritual awareness. My latihan still keeps going ahead and I am rather sure that it will continue even in the hereafter, as it is part of myself. |
| Salamah Pope, Australia: Shopping for God ... I grew up hearing a lot about the non-existence of God from my parents, and a lot about the existence of God in various school and social activities - although there was never any proof of what religious people took for granted. 'God is like Father Christmas' my intelligent, well-educated parents told me, 'you grow out of it when you get older'. That seemed right, because I couldn't feel or experience this thing called 'God', least of all in church. But at the same time I was aware there was a dark and empty chasm inside me, the existential vacuum, which the believers just didn't seem to have. So when I left school I went shopping - for God. I must have tried everything going in London at the time - every religion, every cult, every secular society. And a few years later I found Subud, and God, or perhaps Subud - and God? - found me. And gradually that yawning vacuum was filled, as the Subud spiritual training brought me a living contact with my own unconscious and with the universe out there, too. So the experience of God, as a gentle Energy working within me, proved my parents wrong: but as they had had no such experience I have been grateful ever since for their honesty, because without that I would never have gone looking for God. |
