Listen Up!

          Have you ever noticed how incredibly hard it is to listen? Sure, we can hear and remember things, but when was the last time that something you were listening to took your ENTIRE focus?  And especially when you're in a conversation, you're always thinking of your response, never fully engulfed in what the other person is saying.  This habit is particularly noticeable when listening to a friend preform.  No matter what, you always intently listen for a mistake, and don't even try to deny it.  And that's terrible! Why do we look for the bad, but glance over the good?  Why do we care more about what we say instead of what we can learn from others?  Chances are the person you're talking to isn't fully listening either.  Sometimes I can't even fully enjoy an experience, such as a concert or party etc., because I think too much about how I might respond.  FaceBook has made this even worse for everyone, because now all we think about is a clever status to post about the experience instead of living the moment.  But,  I will tell a funny story about a time I was trying to listen really well.  So, I was sitting in math class, you know how that is, listening very intently to the directions for a standardized test we were taking, because I didn't want to screw anything up.  Our teacher finishes by saying, "And then, when you're finished, you may s*** quietly."  Obviously he meant to say sit, so I was the only one to hear his mistake, and I burst out laughing.  This man is one of the most obnoxious people on the planet, so he turns to me with the strangest look and says "Are you okay?", and I stumble on my words trying to answer.  Needless to say I was smiling through most of the test.  Maybe it wasn't that funny, but it goes to show listening can be rewarding.