DAILY CHIMÉ PHAKMÉ NYINGTIK IN A NUTSHELL

Introduction Of all the teachings that Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo received through the seven methods of transmission, the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik is said to be the most profound because not only does it bring about a long life, but a that is life free of obstacles. It also causes wisdom to blossom and is said to have the most blessings.

The Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik was the heart practice of Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo's student Jamgön Kongtrül Lodrö Taye, and of the fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth Karmapas—Thekchok Dorje, Khakyab Dorje and Rigpe Dorje. Other great Kagyupa masters, like the previous Situ Rinpoche, Situ Pema Wangchuk Gyalpo also practised it, as does the present Sakya Trizin—who has said of this practice, “This is my sole yidam”—and most Nyingma lamas.

The Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik cycle contains a tantra and associated sadhanas, as well as individual Lama sadhanas for accomplishing Guru Rinpoche, Shri Singha and Vimalamitra. Dzogchen is referred to throughout—Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche gave an incredible commentary on the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik which fills an entire volume, and it’s all about Dzogchen. It’s also the cycle that contains the longer sadhana [View pdf] we’ve been practising during this drupchen, for which Jamgön Kongtrül Lodrö Taye wrote a retreat manual [View pdf], a self-empowerment[1] and a fire offering practice[2]. The text we’re using to guide us through the drupchen[3] was put together by Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö. But today we’ll look at the daily practice.

The Daily Sadhana This short sadhana was written by Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo to fulfil Jamgön Kongtrül Lödro Tayé’s request for a daily Chimé Phamé Nyingtik text. The long sadhana describes nine deities, but in the daily practice we only meditate on the main deity, which is why it’s called the ‘single mudra’ practice.

You’ve asked me to tell you how to do the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik as a daily practice. First, you must receive an empowerment. There are three ways of giving the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik empowerment—the elaborate ritual, the medium-length ritual and the simple blessing—and you must receive at least one of them.

Next you must practise the path. Actually, if you were to follow the traditional approach, first you would do a retreat based on the longer sadhana during which, the instructions specify, you should spend twenty-one days on the approach practice, seven on the accomplishment, and one day on the activity phase. So if you add the first afternoon and final morning, a Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik retreat will last 31 days. Usually, only after completing a retreat would you start to practise the daily sadhana. However, you can do the daily sadhana even if you haven’t done a retreat.

Preparation If you just do the daily practice, you don’t need to offer tormas, offerings or long-life pills—although of course, it’s always better to have them. For a retreat you will need supports for your practice—samaya substances—which in this case include a thangka and a kapala containing pills made from the longevity substances mentioned at the beginning of the longer sadhana. I’ve been asked if these substances are difficult to get hold of. No they're not. We have them here in Bir, in large quantities.

The Practice If you’re practising the path of Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik, it’s said to be better to do the practice early in the morning. But it’s also fine to do it at any time.

Before you begin the practice, you must turn your mind inwardly, look at your mind, and motivate yourself with the fervent wish to practise the kyerim and dzogrim of Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik for the sake of all sentient beings. So, first, you must think about this.

Then recite the invocation prayers to ward off any obstacles to your practice by doing whichever prayer you are familiar with—the Seven Line Prayer, for example.

I. The Preliminaries Immediately, the lama appears in the sky before you in the form of White Tara ‘Wish-Fulfilling Wheel’ in union with Amitayus ‘Lord of the Dance’. She is surrounded by all the deities of the mandala, lamas, yidams, dakinis, dharma protectors, and so on. Once you have created this visualisation in your mind, take refuge by repeating the words of the text three times:

Homage! Until we attain enlightenment, I and all living beings Take refuge with unwavering devotion In you, Guru Wish-fulfilling Wheel, who are The very essence of the Three Jewels!

Then, with the objects of refuge as your witnesses, generate bodhichitta. The way you benefit sentient beings is by realizing the unborn nature of things, which is when your service to them becomes truly far-reaching.

At this point, the longer sadhana includes the seven-branch offering, but the daily practice doesn’t and you recite, ‘hung hung hung’ instead. The sound of the ‘hungs’ becomes a huge number of wrathful deities who eliminate all obstructing forces—and of course the real obstructing forces are our thoughts— which are destroyed by the sound of ‘hung’. In fact, just thinking about the meaning of ‘hung’ has the power to chase away all other thoughts.

Now you say vajra jñana raksha ah hung to establish the protective sphere.

What is a protective sphere? It is your mind, which is by nature empty and so negative influences and obstructing forces cannot harm it. In fact none of the five primary elements, like space or earth, can affect it.

Having arranged the offerings, recite the mantra om ah hung sarwa pudza megha samaye hung to bless them. If you don't have actual offerings, don't recite this mantra. Add the Space Treasury mudra and mantra, om nama sarwa tatagate bayo bisho mugebe sarwa takam utgate saparana imam gaganga kam soha, to multiply the offerings and render them inexhaustible, like the offerings made by Samantabhadra.

If you just want to make a small offering, prepare the traditional seven offering bowls, plus amrita and rakta. If you don't have a torma, use some food instead.

II. The Main Practice Up to this point you have been practising the preliminaries. Now we come to the actual practice: meditation on the deity and kyerim, the ‘generation stage’ or ‘creation meditation’.

a) Visualization of the Samayasattva The Three Samadhis To meditate on the deity, start by reciting the mantra, om maha shunyata jnana vajra svabhava emako hang, and establish that everything is ‘emptiness’—sometimes called the ‘great emptiness’. Then follow the text.

First, purify the entire world and all beings within it into the state of emptiness. It is mind that purifies everything into emptiness and mind itself is empty right from the start. Mind is empty, it isn’t made empty. It’s empty naturally, and always has been. When there is delusion mind is simply deluded, but even so, mind is empty. This is an important point. Next, when a thought arises as the natural display of emptiness, you must meditate on compassion for all sentient beings, who are themselves merely the play of emptiness. These are the first two samadhis: ‘the samadhi of suchness, and the ‘samadhi of universal manifestation’.

The dynamic energy of compassion, or rather of the indivisible unity of emptiness and compassion, manifests in the form of the causal syllable ‘tam’, which you can visualize as Tibetan script, or Chinese, or Indian, or any other script.

The three samadhis appear in the text as follows. The luminous space of suchness is the first samadhi; the second samadhi is, in which arises the power of all-illuminating compassion; and the third samadhis is, Their union is the causal samadhi, a white tam...

When you practise kyerim, these three samadhis must be brought to mind right at the beginning. The next part of the text, which begins, Appearing like a rainbow in the sky... is very straightforward. One important point, though, is that those who don't know much about the palaces of deities should just remember that the palace you visualize isn’t an ordinary house. It doesn’t obstruct anything and has no substance, so you can see in from the outside and out from the inside, and it’s made of precious, pure crystal. Everything about it defies the imagination.

In a nutshell, the important points here are:

Having accomplished the meditation on the three samadhis, you meditate on the outer environment. Meditate on the palace. Meditate on the lotus, sun and moon disc seat. Visualize the descent of the syllable tam, which comes to rest on that seat. Meditate on the deities. The rest of this section is very clear. Everyone can understand what’s meant by, “One head, two hands...”, and so on, so I don’t need to explain it to you.

Clear Visualisation As you meditate on yourself as the deity, it is important to hold the image of that deity in your mind as clearly as possible.

A thangka is a ‘samaya support’ for practice. Look at the picture on the thangka, then close your eyes and the picture will appear in your mind. You then check the details of that mental image and repeat the process until you can hold a clear image of the deity in your mind. Once you can do that, play with the image by visualizing it as being very big, then very small, and so on. This is what thangkas are drawn for. Eventually, though, that mental image will not be like a painting or hologram or mere drawing, but vivid and clear.

This aspect of deity practice is called ‘clear visualization’, which means that you should visualize as clearly as you can. However, if you can’t visualize clearly, don’t imagine that your practise is therefore useless, because it isn’t. Simply thinking about the deity is already extremely beneficial.

Vajra Pride Mind is what meditates on the deity. Primordially, your mind is the Buddha; mind is buddha nature. The teachings tell us that delusion is adventitious, which means originally it wasn’t there, it came later. And because delusion came later, it can be eliminated. Had it been primordial, we wouldn’t be able to get rid of it. This is why we practise thinking, “I am the deity.” It’s not a trick! You’re not fooling yourself or trying convince yourself of something that’s not true. So, recognize that you are the deity—we are all buddhas—and steadfastly maintain the vajra pride of being the deity. The sun is always in the sky. When clouds mass overhead you cannot see the sun, but the moment they’ve passed, you can see it perfectly.

Remembering the purity Buddhas and sentient beings are nothing more than the natural radiance of mind, which is by nature empty. So the delusion of thinking, ‘I am a buddha’ is nothing more than the play of the natural radiance of an empty mind. The buddha, the ‘deity’, is also empty. Therefore, ‘remember the purity’. Remember that the appearance of the deity—Jetsun Drolma’s face, hands and so on—are nothing more than the play of emptiness.

These are the three most important elements of the practice: clear visualization, vajra pride and remembering the purity. As you practise, sometimes focus on the clarity of your visualization, sometimes concentrate on maintaining vajra pride, and sometimes, ‘remember the purity’. In other words, we practise kyerim by alternating between these three aspects of practice.

b) Inviting and Absorbing the Jñanasattva Until now you have been meditating on yourself as the deity, and this visualized deity is called the ‘samayasattva’, or samaya being. Next we invite the jñanasattva, the wisdom deities.

First, though, you must actualize the ‘three vajras’. Human beings have three aspects, known as ‘body, speech and mind’. But at this point you are visualizing yourself as the deity, with the deity’s face, hands and so on, and deities also have three aspects, which we call the ‘three vajras’: enlightened body, enlightened speech and enlightened mind. Here, you visualize the three vajras at your forehead, throat and heart. Usually ‘vajra body’ appears as Vairochana, ‘vajra speech’ as Amitabha, and ‘vajra mind’ as Akshobhya, but here, the text says you mark your three places with the three seed syllables om ah hung, which radiate rays of light inviting the jñanasattva, the wisdom deities.

In reality, the wisdom deity and the samaya being are not separate. However, although mind thinks, “They are not different,” it still hangs on to the idea that the wisdom deity must be somehow distinct from the samaya being. And as long as it makes that separation, you will need to invite the wisdom deity. Once samayasattva and jñanasattva are indivisible, you won't need to extend the invitation. The words of the invitation prayer are easy to understand, so follow the text until dza hung bam ho.

Taking Their Seats After the invitation, at samaya tishtha lhan, you ask the deities to take their seats and remain in this place. But the wisdom deity doesn’t take a seat, she simply merges indivisibly with the samaya being, like water poured on water.

Paying Homage Then, you pay homage. A la la ho! expresses amazement at the enlightened body, speech and mind of the deity. Ati pu ho means, ‘I pay homage’, and with prati tsa ho I acknowledge and receive homage. Ultimate prostration is to rest in the realisation of the indivisibility of the deity and yourself.

Offerings Emanate an offering deity who then presents you with the outer offerings which are made up of the seven offerings of cleansing and refreshing waters, incense, flower, lamp, scented water and food, plus music. You also offer the five inner offerings of beautiful forms, sounds, fragrance, taste and touch. Amrita, rakta and torma are the secret offerings and sarva dharmadhatu emako hang indicates the ultimate offering, the offering of ‘suchness’.

In the longer sadhana, the offerings are presented in individual verses which describe each in detail. Here in the daily practice, there’s just one verse for all the offerings, plus the individual mantras of each kind of offering.

Praise The next verse, Om! You were born from the tears..., is the offering of praise.

If you want to practise these three sections of homage, offering and praise you can. But you can also skip them, in which case, having invited the wisdom deity, jump to the mantra recitation section after reciting the mantra samaya tishtha lhan.

Summary Clarity, Stability and Purity: the Essence of Kyerim and Dzogrim The really important points for this practice are the clarity of the visualization, the vajra pride and remembering the purity. Of these three, a strong sense of being the deity is crucial. Trust that you look like the deity, with the absolute confidence that you’re not trying to fool yourself, that it’s not an invention, and that ultimately, the deity is indivisible from your mind. “This is who I am!” If you do not trust in this way, you will not accomplish the practice; but if you do, you will.

The two other aspects on which you meditate—clarity of visualization and vajra pride—are also the play of emptiness and must be dissolved back into emptiness. When you dissolve your visualization (kyerim), back into emptiness, it’s called ‘dzogrim’.

As the text advises, when you tire of practising like this, recite the mantra.

Focusing the Mind on the Enlightened Body of the Deity We have spoken about the three main aspects of kyerim practice—clear visualization, vajra pride and remembering the purity—and you must meditate on each of them in turn. They are the essence of kyerim, and are crucial to kyerim practice. At first, you won’t be able to do all three at once, but as you become more familiar with the practice, you’ll be able to bring them all together. When you reach the point where you have established a clear visualization and vajra pride, immediately remember the purity. This is how you begin to hold all three aspects in your mind at the same time.

For a Vajrayana practitioner—man or woman—the Mantrayana samaya is to perceive the nature of everything as the deity, which means that when you think, “everything is the deity” you automatically meditate on your yidam deity, with the three aspects of clear visualisation, vajra pride and remembering the purity. In other words, there’s never a time when you don’t meditate on the deity. Vajrayana practitioners should try to maintain an awareness of the deity every moment! And if you only have an instant in which to practise, you should still try to maintain that awareness. It’s challenging at first, because you aren’t yet familiar with the practice. Once you get used to it, though, it’ll become easier. Things you’re very familiar with are easy to picture in your mind. For example, if you think of your father, that thought immediately awakens in your mind a picture of all his features, and you can easily hold a visualisation of his eyes, ears, nose and so on in your mind. Not only do you visualize him clearly, but it happens instantly. This will be true when you think of your father, or anyone you know well or live with. Just to hear their name makes the image of that person pop up clearly in your mind. So you must bring the deity to mind again and again, until you become completely familiar with it.

The result of practising in this way is that the temporary obscurations that conceal the ground of the buddha nature present in all of us will diminish as they are purified, and your buddha nature will manifest more and more.

This concludes what I wanted to say about generating the enlightened body of the deity.

The Mantra Recitation: the Enlightened Speech of the Deity Next is the enlightened speech of the deity, which corresponds to, I am the sublime Tara: in my heart... Actualize the meaning of the words as you read them.

In drupchens or empowerments, you must meditate on a ‘self-’ and a ‘front-visualization’, and the front-visualization separates out of the self-visualisation. So you visualize yourself as the mandala of the deity, while generating another mandala in the sky before you that’s identical to the self-visualization. But in this daily practice you don't need to do that. Just visualize yourself as the deity. This is what I am the sublime Tara: in my heart... means.

As I’m sure most of you know, when you meditate on a deity—any deity—the body of that deity isn’t made of flesh, blood, lungs, liver, and so on. It isn’t like the bodies of ordinary human beings, but empty and luminous, an ‘illusory appearance’. In this practice, at White Tara’s heart is Amitayus, the jñanasattva or ‘wisdom being’. The sadhana text just says, in my heart is the jñanasattva Amitayus, which means at the heart of the main deity. It continues, Brilliant white and holding a long life vase in the mudra of meditation. He is, Beautiful with his silk and jewelled ornaments. He sits, In vajra posture on a lotus and moon disc seat, and is Shining and resplendent amidst brilliant rays of light.

Since the main deity, Tara Wish-Fulfilling Wheel is a buddha, she has all the qualities of a buddha—qualities that are inconceivable to us, like the thirty-two major and eighty minor marks, and so on—which, according to the teachings, is why the emanation and reabsorption of light is necessary in visualization practice, but we won’t be discussing how that works here.

In the centre of his heart, meaning in the centre of Amitayus’ heart, is a lotus, a flower. On the seat provided by this flower rests sun and moon discs, in the middle of which is tam, encircled by the revolving mantra mala.

There are four main mantras in the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik, one for each of the three deities of long life and one for all three combined. The mantra that circles the seed syllable will be the mantra of the deity you’re focussing on at that point, and is arranged anti-clockwise so it can turn clockwise.

Reciting the mantra evokes his wisdom mind... This means that you should focus your mind on the mantra. And by focusing on the mantra-mala, you accomplish the recitation of the mantra. When your mind is aware of a mantra, om taré tuttaré soha for example, the recitation is accomplished.

As the mantra-mala revolves around the seed syllable it emanates rays of white light that ...burst out through the tip of the jewel on the ushnisha on the crown of my head. Amitayus is visualized at your heart centre and at first the wisdom light shines out of Amitayus’ ushnisha then up and out through the top of your own head (you in the form of White Tara). It then manifests in the form of countless Namgyalmas—Ushnishavijaya in Sanskrit—white, with one face, two hands and holding a long-life vase and an iron hook.

She radiates light and rays of light and Limitless forms of herself, streaming out like particles of dust in sunbeams... Once the rays of light are streaming out of your visualized body, they transform into an infinite number of different sized Namgyalmas. As they fill the whole of space, they draw in all the subtle vital essence of samsara and nirvana. Samsara refers to the six realms of existence, and nirvana refers to completely enlightened buddhas—all the buddhas in an infinity of universes. The inanimate universe refers to the four primary elements, earth, water, fire and air, while animate means the sentient beings in the inanimate universes—in other words all living beings. The Namgyalmas gather the very essence of everything in samsara and nirvana in the form of great bliss. The ‘great bliss’ appears in the form of white nectar that moves like quicksilver, is radiant with light and is marked with the symbols of ‘great bliss’. The power of this nectar is such that if it’s scattered on a dead tree, the tree will immediately burst into life and become laden with leaves and flowers and fruit; if scattered on a sixty-year old man, he will suddenly have the vigour of a sixteen-year old and his lifespan will be the same as that of the sun and the moon.

This mercury-like nectar is drawn back in through your ‘three doors’, which are your body, speech and mind. Absorb into the bindus of my body, speech and mind... here, body, speech and mind correspond to the enlightened body, speech and mind at our three centres—forehead, throat and heart. The nectar is absorbed into your three centres, Granting me the siddhi of immortal life, And intensifying the wisdom of great bliss.

I believe there is a translation [View pdf] of this text, so this should be clear for you.

As the nectar is absorbed, you receive the siddhi of immortal life. Great bliss, the great mudra (mahamudra) and the great perfection (dzogpachenpo) are intensified.

The text says you should now recite the mantra om taré tuttaré turé soha, then om amarani dziwentiyé soha, followed by, om amrita ayurdadé soha, and you should recite a few more of the first mantra. If you’re short of time you can skip the other two mantras, but if you want to recite them, please do.

Then recite om taré tuttaré turé hrih droom bendza jnana ayukhé soha, which is the mantra of the three main deities and which must be recited when you direct your practice for longevity

These are the points that concern the mantra recitation.

At the end of the session, recite the vowel and consonant mantra and the mantra of the essence of dependent origination. The vowel mantra is a a, i i, u u, ri ri, li li e ai, o au, ang ah. The consonant mantra is ka kha ga gha na, cha chha ja jha nya, ta tha da dha na, ta tha da dha na, pa pha ba bha ma, ya ra la wa sha sha sa ha ksha. And the mantra of the essence of dependent origination is om ye dharma hetu prabhawa hetun teshan tathagato hyavadat teshan tsa yo nirodha evam vade maha shramanah soha. We recite these three mantras to purify any lack of clarity, or unintended additions or omissions in our practice. If you have time, recite these mantras three times, but if you’re in a hurry you can just say them once.

The instructions also say that here we should make a brief offering and praise. The prayers of offering and praise don’t appear in the Tibetan text, but they have been added to the English version, so you just need to follow the text.

Then recite the hundred syllable mantra.

If you have a thangka or a statue, you must to do the rabné (consecration practice).

This concludes the instructions on enlightened speech.

Summary: Enlightened Body and Speech To summarize, we practise the aspect of the enlightened body by visualizing ourselves as White Tara in union, with white Amitayus at her heart. At Amitayus’ heart we visualize the seed syllable tam standing on a sun and moon disc seat that rests on a blossoming lotus. These are what we call 'the three nested sattvas'. The three sattvas are White Tara, Amitayus and the syllable tam and they appear one inside the other.

White Tara’s consort, the male deity Avalokiteshvara, ‘Lord of the Dance’, is the natural radiance of Tara herself. Commentaries say he is white with a slight tinge of red, but on the thangka that belonged to Jamgön Kongtrul and which has instructions on the back written in Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo’s own handwriting, he is red. I know this, because I own the thangka.

This is the enlightened body meditation. When you do the daily practice, you don't need to visualize the entire retinue of deities.

For the mantra meditation, visualize each mantra in succession revolving around the seed syllable —om taré tuttaré turé soha around tam, then om amarani dziwentayé soha, around hrih, then om amrita ayurdadé soha around droom, then om tare tuttare ture hri droom vajra jnana ayuke soha around tam.

As you focus your mind on this visualization, also imagine that as the mantra revolves, it emanates light which fills Amitayus completely. The light then streams out of the top of his head and fills Tara. Once Tara is completely full of light, rays stream out of the top of her head and manifest in the form of an infinite number of Namgyalmas (Ushnishavijaya), who are white and hold long-life vases in their left hands and iron hooks in their right. Namgyalma gathers nectar with her iron hook and collects it in her vase.

This is how to direct the practice as you follow the words of the sadhana.

The mantra activity you visualize, very briefly, is of rays of light that emanate from the syllables of the mantra, accomplish the activities, then immediately return and dissolve back into the self-visualization as nectar. The nectar enters your three doors (body, speech, and mind) by dissolving into your three places (forehead, throat and heart). As it does so you blaze magnificent and resplendent and receive the blessings as I’ve just described.

The mantra you must recite most of is om taré tuttaré turé soha. Recite fewer of the two other mantras, the mantra of Amitayus and the mantra of Ushnishavijaya. Also recite the combined mantra. If you wish to direct the practice for long life, accumulate more of the combined mantra. Here, in the drupchen, as we direct the practice for longevity, we accumulate three times more of the combined mantra than of the others.

After the main mantras, recite the vowel and consonant mantras and the mantra of the essence of dependent origination, as I’ve described. Then, recite the verses of offering and praise and the hundred syllable mantra.

In terms of what kind of mala to use, a crystal mala is good for this practice.

This was the instruction on enlightened speech.

III. The Conclusion Dissolution: The Enlightened Mind of the Deity Now, the enlightened mind.

A! The samayasattva, rigpa's natural display with its attributes, like the face and hands, dissolves into all-pervading space. The deity and all her aspects—what we have just been visualizing—are nothing more than rigpa’s natural display. The entire environment melts into light and dissolves into the palace. The palace melts into light and dissolves into the deity, which melts into light starting at both the lotus seat on which she sits and the top of her head, and working towards the centre of her body. White Tara dissolves into Amitayus, who melts into light and dissolves into the samadhisattva, the syllable tam. Tam melts into light from top and bottom (like Tara), and disappears so there’s nothing left. Everything that was is now empty like space. And you rest in that state.

Once again like a rainbow appearing in the sky I arise as the play of great wisdom. This means that the deity manifests once more.

This concludes the instructions on the aspect of enlightened mind.

Now you say, om ah hung because the deity has appeared again and we must invoke the three aspects of enlightened body (om), enlightened speech (ah) and enlightened mind (hung).

As I told you earlier, Vajrayana practitioners must constantly maintain the awareness of the deity and meditate as if they themselves are Jetsün Tara.

And of course, at the end of the practice session, you dedicate, and add the relevant verses of auspiciousness—Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo didn’t include them in his daily practice.

This is how to do this daily practice of Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik.

Summing Up and Conclusion At the beginning of the practice you invoke the masters of the lineage with the appropriate prayers.

Then meditate on refuge and bodhichitta—recite the prayers as many times you like, three, or one, or whatever. What’s important is that you really pay attention to the meaning of the words and actualize it.

Say hung three times to eliminate all obstacles and obstructing forces.

With the mantra vajra jnana raksha ah hung generate the protective sphere.

If you make offerings, recite, om ah hung sarwa pudza megha samaye hung to bless them, followed by the sky treasury mantra and mudra. If you don't make physical offerings, you don't need to do these mantras and mudra.

The mantra om maha shunyata is the beginning of the meditation on the deity, as I explained above. Then comes the section of paying homage, offering and praise. They are good to do, but you can also skip them. The practice text says, “If you wish occasionally to perform a concise homage, offering and praise”. So, if you wish, you can; if you don't, you don't have to. What you absolutely must do is follow the practice faithfully up until samaya tishtha lhan, then if you want to skip paying homage, offerings and praise, jump to I am the sublime Tara: at my heart...

Next you accumulate the mantras for as long as you can, then you do the offering and praise. If you want a short offering and praise, just use the short prayer we do during the drupchen, yeshé lhatsok chendren shek...[4]

This concludes the practice of the enlightened speech of the deity.

The enlightened mind starts with, A! The samayasattva, rigpa's natural display... and after the dissolution you rest in meditation. As in this kind of practice we must bring together kyerim and dzogrim, at this stage we do dzogrim meditation. All phenomena are perfect and complete within the nature of mind: dzogrim means ‘completion stage.’

When you reach enlightenment, you'll continue to manifest for the sake of sentient beings, and similarly, here we arise once again as the deity and make an auspicious connection by appearing again, like a rainbow in the sky.

At the beginning we generated bodhichitta, didn’t we? During the practice we maintain our awareness. At the end, we dedicate. So the ‘three authentics’—also known as the ‘three noble principles’—are complete: good at the beginning, good in the middle and good at the end.

Now I hope you’ll be able to do this practice.

Resources: Orgyen Tobgyal’s Teachings on Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche instructed me, quite strongly, to teach this practice. Last April, here in Bir, I taught everything I know about it, in great detail. I relied on many important sources like the terma text [View pdf], Jamgön Kongtrül’s retreat instructions [View pdf], and the presentation of the four nails by Dza Patrul Rinpoche[5]. I also drew points from the Lam Rim Yeshé Nyingpo. Nowadays, as the usual method of study is to listen to recordings, you are welcome to listen to those teachings.

I received these teachings many times from Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. He practised the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik every day without fail and always recited the combined mantra of the three main deities, om tare tuttare ture hri droom vajra jnana ayuke soha one thousand times. He never missed a single day!

I’ve explained the daily practice in Lerab Ling and I went over each word of the practice for those who were going into three-year retreat. So you may want to listen to those teachings too.

[1]Essence of Wisdom Nectar, in Phagma Nyingthig Liturgies, Siddhartha’s Intent Transaltion, 2008, p.131-136.

[2]Greatly Increasing Wisdom, in Phagma Nyingthig Liturgies, p.137-142.

[3]The Framework Liturgy, ‘Treasure Trove of Wisdom’. The translation is in woven in the Phagma Nyingthig Liturgies.

[4]yeshe lhatsok chendren shek

Assembly of wisdom deities, I invite you. Please come! chi nang sangwé chöpa bul

I offer you outer, inner and secret offerings.

ku sung tuk yön trinlé tö

I praise your body, speech, mind, quality and activity.

bakmé galtrul nyamchak shak

I confess careless transgressions and errors.

maha amrita balingta rakta khahi

[5] Patrul Chokyi Wangpo, The Melody of Brahma Reveling in the Three Realms: Key Points for Meditating on The Four Stakes That Bind the Life-Force in Deity, Mantra and Wisdom, Snow Lion, 2006, p.81-96.

Source

https://all-otr.org/cpn/9-chime-phakme-nyingtik-in-a-nutshell