1). Think of a recent situation in which you found listening difficult. Which one (or more) of the four phases presented the most difficulty for you? Why? How could this have been overcome?

I personally feel that I have trouble sensing because of noise, my girlfriend thinks that I just have selective attention but I feel that would make me feel like a jerk. I listen to her but there’s usually a lot going on around us in restaurants and shopping districts that I just can't totally hear what she says 100% of the time. I could have avoided this if there were less people around making noise but that feels uncontrollable in my opinion. Because I cannot hear her in noisy areas such as restaurants or shopping districts I usually find myself trying to piece together the puzzle of what shes saying so I can avoid having her repeat what she says. Reason why I avoid asking her to repeat herself is because she often gets offended to doing that. My evaluation of what shes trying to say during my noise problems usually come out as a 50% chance of good. My problems could be easily overcome if she didn't feel so offended when I ask her to repeat herself, at least repeating herself would give be a better idea of what shes talking about.