When practicing on retreat, isolate yourself. First drop everything from the past and everything related to the future. Create an island of time that separates you from before and after these seven days. Refrain from reading, writing, talking and making phone calls. So far as the outside world is concerned, you did not exist before and you will not exist afterward. You are living on a Virgin Island with no knowledge of anything outside. Unless you think like this, you will be dragging along a huge tail, carrying a lot of baggage and it will be very painful. You will have come not to meditate, but to indulge in false thinking. If any outside thoughts occur, tell yourself I was born on this Virgin Island. These outside thoughts have nothing to do with me. Second, isolate yourself from others. Within this island of time create an island of space which only you inhabit. There is only one person on your cushion. You give your body to the cushion and your mind to the method. If people walk by you or sit beside you, this has nothing to do with you. If someone behaves strangely, if someone runs in and does cartwheels or if your back itches, you will respond in the same way. This has nothing to do with me. There is a saying fundamentally there is nothing in the world to be concerned about. But people make trouble for themselves. If the outside world does not influence your mind, nothing can disturb you. It's one of the great things about Sheen is that we can have this sense of being alone. We're not greeting each other as we walked past the hole in the hallway, we're not looking up catching other people's eyes. For as for a monitor, there's nothing more disheartening than to have somebody look you in the eye when there is no need to do that all of us have our business to do. And we support each other without distracting each other. Third, isolate yourself from your previous thought, and from your succeeding thought, good or bad, do not be concerned with them. Just take the present thought and tie it to the meditation method. That's what's most important. The past is gone, the present is dying, and the future is not yet. Regret satisfaction worries expectations. These are all delusions, to not waste a second on them.