 And also, and Suzanne was sharing about her group, this feeling of being kind of addicted to the story, so there's like a story that's being told or a storyline that's repeating over and over and over and you get a sense that the healing has to be beyond the storyline and yet it's like just a bad habit that just you find yourself thinking and speaking in those terms over and over repeating the same stories kind of like you know in movies when two people meet at a restaurant or whatever for the first time and and they start talking and then one or the other or both pour their hearts out and they pour out their their stories here's my story well here's my story oh a moment of intimacy two stories have been told but now with the course it's we're sensing that the intimacy goes much deeper than the stories we have to actually let go of the purpose underneath for telling the stories some of you might have seen that movie I Heart Huckabees with Lily Tomlin, Dustin Hoffman, Jude Law, it's a very good movie but in that movie Jude Law is always telling a Shania Twain story about he pulled a fast one over on Shania Twain I think it's around chicken salad or something and and he tells the story over and over and over through the movie until the existential detectives Lily Tomlin and Dustin Hoffman start to work with him on why do you tell the story one of the feelings of inadequacy why by putting down Shania Twain someone who seems to be popular this popular put down put lifts lifts him up this his image up in some way like he pulled a fast one on Shania Twain and what's underneath that is there's great fear and inadequacy so we have to get to the underlying motives of why we tell our stories otherwise they just seem to repeat over and over and we may not even be consciously aware of why we're telling the same stories over and over maybe it's the tension getting maybe it's the sense that we think it gives us a pseudo sense of superiority or power or control or pride oftentimes stories are told because there's this pride in the story my grandmother got up into her 80s and 90s and was diagnosed with dementia and she would typically repeat stories to me from back in the late 1920s the same stories over and over back in the abundant era right before the depression hit the United States and she would tell the stories over and over and over she was also very deep into the Bible didn't believe that death was real didn't believe that God would ever send anyone to hell we used to have great discussions and at one point it she was telling her stories from the late 1920s 1927 1928 for the umpteenth time and then Jesus threw me said what's the purpose of the story and she just was like what do you mean I said what's the what's the purpose of this story you just told me she said well it has to have a purpose she says it does it must be a purpose and eat the story if you tell me the story repeatedly she said I don't know I can't I don't know I don't know there is a purpose and I said I said well you love Jesus she's oh yes I love Jesus and in the Gospels you know he would tell stories too he would tell parables but he would tell the parable the prodigal son and the parable of the the one who owns the farm who pays all the workers the same amount even though the first ones that work all day and the ones that just come in at the last second he pays them all the same said he always had a purpose there was always a reason for telling his stories he was teaching a message he had a lesson or whatever she said you're right every single story he ever had it always had a purpose she said that's right he said so what's the purpose of your story she said hi I don't know I think I just like it and that's it we like these stories even if they don't have a purpose we're willing to tell them to stranger over and over because we like them we actually like the stories we're addicted to telling stories where we've all become storytellers and now we're so addicted to it that we don't want to stop but the course is teaching us that we need to have a purpose for our stories we need to use words in a purposeful way to inspire and to bless and if our stories have achy breaky heart you know sad songs you know all kinds of heartbreak and pain and misery or if we keep retelling our nightmares over and over and over and over what's the purpose of telling nightmares you know is that to inspire and bless do we really feel that we're helping all of humankind by telling our nightmare stories you know as we watch their faces shocked and or is that or is that there's a bit of pride and my nightmare is bigger and worse than yours will ever be and don't you forget it you know there's there has to be a reason and a purpose