To Cultivate One’s Mind Is to Polish a Brick into a Mirror

Xuefeng

March 24, 2021

The cultivating world always advocates that people should "cultivate the heart." At first, I felt that this term was too profound to be understood, it must be right, but the more I practiced it, the more I realized that I was fooled and got the feeling that this was like teaching people to polish bricks into mirrors.

Where is the mind? Is it inside the chest cavity or outside? Is it in cosmic time and space, or in bread and milk? Is it square or round? Is it in black and white or in color? Is it made of meat or mud?

Buddha Shakyamuni warned: "neither the past, the present nor the future of the mind can be found " Since "the heart (the mind) does not exist", what should I cultivate? How should I cultivate it? House leaks can be repaired, clothes can be repaired, mobile phones can be repaired, roads can be repaired but how do we fix the mind?

Phenomenon gives birth to minds, but minds can transcend over phenomenon. The mind does not exist, without the phenomena of the universe and without it, there would be no mind. A hundred years ago, was there such a saying as "Hi! He only has watching TV on his mind"? No! Because before TV appeared, how could you have watching TV on your mind? Ask a seven or eight-year-old child, "Is your wife in your heart?" How does the seven or eight-year-old child answer? He does not have a wife at all so how can he have his wife on his mind?

Some people say, "His mind is smaller than the eye of a needle". How is it possible to cultivate a mind that is smaller than the eye of a needle?

Some people say "His mind is bigger than the sky". How is it possible to cultivate a mind that is bigger than the sky?

In Zen, there is a theory of "changing your surroundings with the mind". This statement is reasonable, at least you can understand what it means, but if you advocate “cultivating the mind", it is like a tiger that wants to eat the sky with nowhere to start.

So, I understood that the so-called " cultivating of the mind" was a trap to fool a fool.