从文本字段中检索用户输入

What is the best way to retrieve user-input text from a text field on Submit button press? I am having issues with the listener, because it doesn't return anything (located in my gui class). I need to somehow retrieve what the user inputs, then return to the main class, and decide from there what to do with the user input. an example code would be nice!What is the best way to retrieve user-input tex