How can I create a Selectable with preselected items?

How can I create a Selectable with preselected items?

I want to filter some stuff using a Selectable. Works fine. My problem is that I need to save the selection so that the user has the same filtering active when he returns.

Saving the values is of course easy, but I can't find any way to load that selection back in. Said in another way: I can't find a way to select items programmatically.

Having a way to select items from code would solve all my problems in this case, because I could then select the ones I need after having created the Selectable. In addition this allows me to add some buttons with pre-set selections. Is this possible right now? Or is it impossible to do this using the jQuery UI Selectable widget?