Out-of-Body Experiences
The following article was originally written with a lot of wishful hope, as it does not happen that way.
In reality people find their way to Subud. However, I know a few people who came to Subud after reading something I had written. The time has to be right for each person. The time period when I joined Subud, mankind archived the impossible. The four minute mile, planes broke the sound barrier and outer space travel became a reality. There was another barrier that humankind has searched from time immemorial.
My feeling is that the time is right now, to share my experiences with whoever finds them. In the year 2020 humankind is at a crossroads, and life on planet earth may not be the same again. In human history, in times like this help has come from a divine source. Here is my story, if you have ears that can hear or eyes that see, you may pick up something from this. This is a touchy subject but it changed my life forever.
A real Out Of Body experience (OBE) or even a Near Death Experience (NDE) happens on its own, you have no control and it just comes your way, it's your lucky day. It happens in another realm and all the scientific knowledge we have accumulated cannot explain it. This is the real problem.
A thousand words cannot convey the beauty of a painting or a piece of music and a million words cannot bridge this gap or explain an experience from the spiritual realm. Nor can the laws of nature and scientific knowledge or rational thinking bridge this gap - for all true spiritual experience comes from another realm. I can see why many who had such experiences were reluctant to share them. Am I going to succeed where others failed? The answer is, "NO." All I can say is this: it is possible and each person must find their own individual way to truth and understanding. I am not a Guru or a mystic, I lived a normal life and loved it, and all these things just came my way. Life was always full of ups and downs for me, never a straight line. Once I was convinced of the reality of my Subud experience, I kept it in the forefront.
The first story I write, after much contemplation. The person who told me about the events of his very early life passed away not too long ago. He was an honorable person and had no reason to make up this story. He was born in Ceylon, so that is the connection and it happened in the late nineteen twenties. "A" as I will call him was a well known figure in his profession. We had met a few times before as members of the same worldwide Association and it was the usual greeting, "Hi," or, "How are you?" I did not know he was born in Sri Lanka until the year 2001, when he shared this story of this extraordinary experience of his mother.
Over the past fifty plus years, I have heard from men and women who have had an OBE or a NDE and all had a common understanding.
An OBE or NDE has its value or benefit for the person who experiences it. We may call it a gift that comes our way when least expected. Stories cannot get you past the "fourth barrier". What I share below is mainly for those who had a similar experience and have been reluctant to share it, or have doubts about it. Doubts can arrive with time. The only negative aspect for me about my own OBE was the disbelief by many at the beginning and it made me reluctant to share about it for some time. I can understand it today. here was a young fellow among his peers and long time seekers. It must have looked unfair, unjust and unreal.
"A" father was a Britisher and a Tea planter in the Matale area in Ceylon, his parents had come to the city of Kandy when his mother was about to deliver her first born and stayed at the Suisse Hotel which still exists. For reasons unknown to "A" his parents decided to have the baby at the hotel and a midwife was hired to help deliver the baby. A baby boy was born in due course but his mother subsequently took very ill due to an infection. Her life was ebbing away and reached a point when no pulse was detected. At this time his mother was experiencing an OBE, She found herself in England in her parent's home, but none were aware of her presence. Then she heard a loud voice say, "You must return to Ceylon if you want your child to live."
Soon she found herself in Kandy and life returned by slow degrees. His mother had told her experience to her husband, who had later shared it with their son when he was old enough to understand. The family returned to England after awhile and his mother lived a few years more.
I met "A" several years later in Perth Australia where he had settled down and one day we had time to sit down and share many spiritual experiences. I felt a closeness to him, I did not have before.
After doing latihan for nearly two years, one day after returning home from latihan, I was reading a book late in the night while lying on the bed, head up against the headboard and pillow behind. It was past 11 pm and I was quite awake, and there was an awareness, a feeling of the latihan like a very fine current going through my body.
Next thing I knew I was up near the ceiling, I could actually see my body lying on the bed with the book fallen to one side. Wow! I wondered if I could move, and, sure enough, I could move around the room hovering just below the ceiling. There was this feeling of absolute quiet, peace and detachment from everything, together with an awareness of existence free of all fear. It was unreal, in that normally you have a sense of fear as long as we live in this body. But it was no longer there, and the thought entered my awareness that not even a bullet could harm me. "Could I wonder around outside?" I thought to myself, and before the thought entered my mind I was outside. The sense of freedom was unreal, although after a while there was a feeling of uncertainty, more like a shadow, "What if I could not get back?"
Something then happened that I cannot understand or explain to this day: it is as if there was a blank space, because the next thing I knew I was back on the bed, time had passed. The lights were on and the book was lying on the bed. Nothing had changed except that I felt cold, although a feeling of warmth soon returned. I felt a feeling of bliss and it lasted for a long, long time. I was wide awake and half expected to take off again! Closer to dawn, I switched off the lights and went to sleep.
Something had happened beyond my normal understanding, but I had not lost awareness for one moment. During the OBE experience, I had little or no awareness of the passage of time. The whole experience was so real, it was like taking a walk down the street where I lived. I first shared it with the Subud brother who was responsible for me being in Subud and he thought I was in crisis ! I had the natural reaction not to share this experience with others. however it gave me the courage overcome adversity on my spiritual journey.
A few years later another Subud member from our group also had an out-of body experience. He was older and wiser and only shared it with a few close Subud friends. He had one remarkable quality till he passed away a few years back: he never missed latihan. If he did it was not more than a dozen times in over fifty years.
In the mid-sixties, my good friend and Subud brother Rusli visited Cilandak for the first time during the Ramadan fast. Back home again, he told me that one night he had done latihan and was lying on a mat in the main latihan hall, just feeling the latihan, when he wondered about his family and life back home. Suddenly he felt a separation and the freedom to move; he followed his feeling and in a short time he was at his home thousands of miles away in Colombo. He was inside the house , hovering above, and could see his wife preparing tea. He playfully touched her, shocking her, so that she nearly spilled the tea! Some time later I talked to her and was able to verify about this incident.
As Rusli was talking about his experience, I realized how close it was to my own, except that he had traveled a few thousand miles. Amazingly, his exact words were, "I would not have cared if someone put a sword through me," mirroring my own reaction.
Next day he told Bapak about his experience. "You have been blessed with a gift,” Bapak commented. “If it happens again, do not wonder too far as you may not find your way back!"
Over the years I met several Subud brothers and sisters who had similar experiences, although you do not have to be a Subud member to have such an experience. While living abroad in the early 80s, for example, I met with a bad motor vehicle accident when I was hit by a drunk driver travelling at over 100 mph. While recuperating, one of my work colleagues visited me and told me about a nasty road accident he himself had experienced. He almost broke his spine, lost all feeling below the waist, and experienced an OBE while he was been operated on, during which time he was able to observe the whole thing from above. As a result David became a seeker, and back at work I casually told him about Subud and the latihan. David and wife joined Subud and are still active to this day!
The young son of another Subud member also had an OBE in his early teens, although he took his time and got opened later in life after he had children of his own.
It is my strong belief that there are no accidents in life, a conviction that arises from my latihan experience that even being here during this time period was no accident. Especially meeting those people with whom we have a lasting relationship.
