How to use the mind fully?

The following is an excerpt from a samvaad (dialogue) session with Acharya Prashant.

Questioner(Q): They will also teach the same thing, first of all, they wash the mind and they say do not apply the mind, and after that what happens? Conditioning. The same has happened to us till now. We have been taught, “This is a stone and God is inside the stone.” We have said, okay. If we say, why? They say, “Here you don’t have to use your brain.” This has been told by you also. I have listened in the discourse that, “you have a mind and use it.” Now where it has to be used, how it has to be used, up to which extent it should be used, or it should be dropped?

Acharya Prashant (AP): It has to be absolutely used. Your assertion is totally inverted. My teaching is, use the mind fully. You want to be adamant that the mind will be used only partially. Do you know what is partial usage of the mind? The partial usage of the mind is, “I will question everything on the outside, but I will never let the mind question the mind itself.”

You want to ask, “Does that statue have God?” Have you ever asked, does this statue have me (referring to the questioner)? Why do you stop there? I am challenging you. You find a statue outside and you want to ask, “Does this statue contain God?” You too are a statue. Have you ever asked, “Does this statue contain me?” I am asking you to apply your mind fully. Don’t apply it to just the outside, apply it to yourself also.

When the mind starts turning inwards, the mind gets annihilated. And that is why you want to live this deception. You want to say, “I want to use the mind.” C’mon I dare you, use the mind upon yourself, why don’t you? Why don’t you look at the mind to look at the limitations of the mind, why don’t you?

The scriptures very clearly say, “Use the mind to illuminate the mind.” They say, “Use the mind to look at the mind.” But you use the mind to look at everything else except the mind. why this discrimination, why this partial usage, why? Use the mind fully. What else can you use anyway? You are totally identified with the mind. So, what else can you use? Go ahead use it.

Now, why is the mind so silent? Why is it not talking?