I listen to dozens of speakers every year, the majority of them are political.  Truth be told I have sat through a few horrible presentations but on the whole I like to hear what other people are working on and thinking about.  It occurred to me last week while researching an upcoming speaker that I was more focused on what I am going to say, ie the questions I ask, then what the speaker was going to say.  But if I am spending the 30 minutes before each event thinking only about myself what would happen if I had not bothered to prepare?  Do most people spend the first half hour of every speech thinking about how to stump the speaker or what they can say?

Listening first solves problems; in school I did better when I listened fully to the instructions before beginning a task or asked a question.  Maybe Politicians and all the politically minded of us should listen first before forming an opinion.

So Thanks to all of our Elected Officials for coming home to here what we have say.