The Four Essential Dharma of Drukpa Kargyu
These are the four essential Dharma or practices of Drukpa Kargyu (Pal Druk Pei Thral Goi Choe Shyi དཔལ་འབྲུག་པའི་འཕྲལ་དགོས་ཆོས་བཞི་ནི།). "THRAL" means often require from time to time, not one-off kind of thing. "GOI" means needed, a must or essential. "THRAL GOI" literally means of immediate necessity or that needing to be done quickly and often. "CHOE" is Dharma; and "SHYI" means four. "PAL DRUGPEI" is referring to the Glorious Drukpa Kargyu. The Four Essential Dharma or Practices of Drukpa Kargyu is what it denotes in this line.
(1) The practice of Buddha Vajrasattva to cleanse the transgressed vows and broken samayas.
(Tib: Dorje Sempa Nyeitung Thrudpei Choe རྡོ་རྗེ་སེམས་དཔའ་ཉེས་ལྟུང་འཁྲུད་པའི་ཆོས།)
The practice of Vajrasattva, or Dorje Sempa in Tibetan, cleanses all obscurations, particularly those related to transgressed vows and broken samayas.
As Vajrayana practitioners, we are constantly breaking the samayas due to our ignorance and lack of knowledge. If we do not keep the samayas well, it becomes the primary hindrance to the progress of our practices. No matter how much we practice; the progress will not be there.
Thus, for those who have entered the path of Vajrayana, the first priority is, to constantly purify, correcting the karma, and fulfilling the broken samayas along the path. Once the karma has been purified, and all the samayas are filled, you'll feel increasing blessings and improvements. Your practices and meditation will steadily progress and heightened.
(2) The practice of Buddha Akshobhya to purify the causes of taking rebirth in the three lower realms.
(Tib: Kangkani Ngensong Jongbei Choe ཀཾ་ཀ་ནི་ངན་སོང་སྦྱོང་བའི་ཆོས།)
The Akshobhya Buddha sadhana is renowned, especially for its power and effectiveness in the purification of negative karma. It can liberate not only the practitioners themselves from the fear of an unfortunate rebirth, but also for innumerable mother beings.
We all have accumulated countless negative Karma in our incalculable lives since the beginningless time, which causes our current misfortunes, sicknesses and the never-ending cyclic existence.
Meditation and recitation on Akshobhya Buddha are most effective for cleansing the karma related to harmful deeds and unwholesome actions. Through the power of this practice, the forces of negative karma are weakened. By purifying one's karma, it will bring tremendous benefits and improvements to one's lives, helps eliminates the afflictive emotions and reduces the obstacles in both worldly and spiritual pursues. Only then one can progress steadily in their path to enlightenment.
(3) The practice of immortal Buddha Amitayus to achieve favourable conditions for life-extension.
(Tib: Tshepagmed Chimed Drubpa Tshering Bei Choe ཚེ་དཔག་མེད་འཆི་མེད་སྒྲུབ་པའ་ཚེ་སྲིང་བའི་ཆོས།)
We have obtained this precious human life, and to make our lives meaningful; we wish to practice the Dharma, as long as we could. If we could not live long, that's a waste. We have lost the opportunity to end the perpetuate sufferings we have endured for millions of lives, and we would never know when we will be able to obtain this preciousness again.
For that purpose, we must extend our lives. We have to live long enough to practice the Dharma and reach accomplishment within that limited years, for the benefits of self and other. However, our lives are full of obstacles and challenges; that's the reason we practice the long-life Amitayus Buddha.
(4) The practice of The Lord of Great Compassion to bless the mind continuum to arouse compassion.
(Tib: Thugje Chenpo Gyud Jingyi Lobpei Choe ཐུགས་རྗེ་ཆེན་པོ་རྒྱུད་བྱིན་གྱི་རློབ་པའི་ཆོས།)
The root of the practice is compassion. In order to improve our loving-kindness and compassion toward other, we have to develop and deepen our compassion along the path. The number of beings is vast and incalculable, so if we aspire to help these limitless mother sentient beings, we need to practice the compassionate form of Buddha to expand our loving kindness and compassion.