Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche gave this teaching the day before Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche gave the Rigpa Sangha and many other students, the elaborate empowerment of Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik. 

Translated by Adam Pearcey. Originally published on Lotsawahouse. 

Translated by Adam Pearcey. Originally published on Lotsawahouse

One rainy summer’s afternoon in Lerab Ling, Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche spoke about how and why in our tradition we should do long life practices then, at Sogyal Rinpoche’s request, went on to focus specifically on the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik. The teaching turned out to be a crash course on how to do the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik, including a brief yet complete instruction on kyerim practice. It is the shortest instruction Rinpoche has ever given on the subject and a very good starting point for beginners.

That day, the simultaneous translation into French was done by Stéphane Arguillère, and translation from French into English was done by Ane Samten Palmo.

Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche gave this teaching over two evenings during a ten-day Chime Phakmé Nyingtik drupchen presided over by Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche and Chokling Rinpoche. The drupchen took place at Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche’s home in Bir, India, and one of its purposes was to consecrate the new temple he had built in his backyard. Some of the Taiwanese students who participated in the drupchen asked Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche to give them a short, essential instruction that would help them make the most of their Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik ‘daily practice’ [View pdf].

At the end of Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche’s stay in Lerab Ling, twenty yogis and yoginis asked him how to do a Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik retreat. Rinpoche didn’t have much time, so it wasn’t possible to base his instructions on the longer sadhana, so instead he told them how to do a retreat based on the daily sadhana. And as he didn’t quite finish the teaching before he left Lerab Ling, he completed it from his bed in Paris, with a tape recorder as his sole audience.

Based on Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrö Thaye's commentary to Khyentse Wangpo's Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik, these teachings were given during a three-year retreat at Bois Bas (near Saint-Léon-sur-Vézère) in the Dordogne, between 1994 and 1997. The retreat was guided by Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche and Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche’s teachings were received by nine retreatants. Many thanks to Steve Cline for making the digital transfer from cassette.

Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche taught for three days for about six hours in four sessions every day, from the 22nd to the 24th of April 2011 at Deer Park, Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche's open Buddhist platform in North India, in a village called Bir. Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche asked Orgyen Tobgyal to teach the Chime Phakme Nyingtik for his retreatants, even though the public gathered in Deer Park on those sunny April days were by and large not the destined target for whom the teachings were recorded. Unfortunately, three of the four sessions of the second day were not recorded.  These teachings were edited based on notes and further clarification with Rinpoche.

In May 2009, Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche gave a series of teachings on Yumka Dechen Gyalmo. Just before one teaching, the Rigpa sangha asked Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche if he would include an explanation about how to direct their practice for the long life of Sogyal Rinpoche. Rinpoche agreed, but felt that, for the sake of auspiciousness, it would better if he talked about long-life practice first.

Many of us hadn’t realized how uniquely qualified Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche is to explain the authenticity of practising the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik as a drupchen, until he spoke about the origins of this tradition during such a drupchen at Lerab Ling.

Towards the end of the annual Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik drupchen in Lerab Ling in 2015, Rinpoche explained a meditation that is specific to this practice. Over the years, he said, he had given all the instructions necessary for us to practise the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik, except one very important one: the torma meditation.

At Lerab Ling in 1996, prompted by one of His Holiness Sakya Trizin’s divinations, Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche and his monks performed a Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik drupchen and a ceremony dedicated to Sogyal Rinpoche’s long life. Since then, this drupchen has become an annual event. The long-life ceremony Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche performs is based on a text by Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo that involves a sundok and tenshuk, the principles of which Rinpoche explains in this teaching.

Every year, the Rigpa Sangha and Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche combine forces to offer Sogyal Rinpoche a ‘tenshuk’– a ceremony that aims at stabilizing and even lengthening life that’s traditionally offered to a master – following a text Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo compiled called Sweet Droplets of Amrita from the Mouths of Siddhas. This year, 2015, we wanted to do a slightly simpler version of the practice, and to ensure that the potency and authenticity were preserved, asked Orgyen Tobgyal Rinpoche for his advice. His response was that we should do the Chimé Phakmé Nyingtik...