Sūtra of the Collection of the Father and Son, Lecture Notes (Thirty-Four)

How can one be adorned with major and minor marks (lakṣaṇa-vyañjana-sampad)?

The tathāgatagarbha has no marks, and neither do the four great elements—earth, water, fire, and wind—have marks. There is no human mark, no mark of a deva's physical body, no male mark and no female mark, no mark of an animal, no mark of a hungry ghost, no mark of a hell-being's physical body, and no mark of an asura's physical body. However, when the four great elements form a physical body, they gradually fashion out a mark—the human mark, the animal mark, the marks of beings of the six realms, the male and female marks are thus transformed and produced. The tathāgatagarbha does not transform marks arbitrarily and without pattern; He manifests them in accordance with the karmic seeds contained within the mind-substance.

Therefore, we should not complain about why our physical body is the way it is, why I was born with a female body, why I suffer from illness and pain, why my appearance is not dignified. If there is anything to complain about, complain about the karmic actions you yourself created in past lives. What kind of appearance one has is determined by the karma one has created. So if we wish to have a good physical appearance, we must create wholesome karma. Which appearance is the best? It is the Buddha's thirty-two major marks and eighty minor marks—this is the finest, purest, and most majestic appearance. But attaining such adorned marks is truly not easy: one must continuously create wholesome karma, continuously eliminate unwholesome and defiled karma, and in the end one must also extensively create karma that is neither wholesome nor unwholesome, in order to become a Buddha and attain adorned marks like the Buddha's. Merely creating wholesome karma to be reborn in the heavens is not enough; in the end one must create karma that is neither wholesome nor unwholesome, and only when the mind attains tranquility (praśama) and non-action can one become a Buddha, thereby possessing the most complete and perfect appearance.