Netflix’s company profile begins by touting its impressive numbers: “Netflix is the world’s leading Internet television network with over 69 million members in over 60 countries enjoying more than 100 million hours of TV shows and movies per day ….”
Let me put that last number into perspective for you. 100 million hours equals almost 11,408 years. In one day, we collectively watch more than 11 millennia of TV shows and movies.
We could lament our entertainment-saturated culture, or we could laud its efforts to tell engaging stories that seek to make real change in the world. But at its core, these incredible numbers reveal what we already know.
We crave stories.
We can’t get enough of them.
Whether it’s to escape, to engage, to indulge, or to learn, stories attract us like moths to the soft glow of a TV screen.
I think there’s an even deeper reason why so many of us like to watch our favorite movies and shows: we’re gathering scripts to fill our relational filing cabinet.
In the same way that we receive scripts about how the way the world works from our parents and from the events in life that have hurt us, so too do we collect scripts from the stories we ingest on a constant basis.
We learn how to act heroically by watching The Avengers or Zero Dark Thirty.
We learn how to date by watching When Harry Met Sally or Sleepless in Seattle.
We learn how to parent by watching Parenthood or Modern Family.
Now, I’m not saying we do this consciously. Few people would admit to learning how to parent from a TV show. But I am suggesting that these stories work themselves into our lives and provide yet more stories you tell yourself.
Looking back on your life, or even your last week, what stories that you’ve watched have become part of the script by which you live your life?
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