Coaching isn't the same as a coffee chat with a friend. Listening to distracting stories isn't what you're being paid for as a coach. Your clients already know their stories. They've been living with them and telling them to themselves over and over. They're now looking for finer stories and finer lives. If you don't redirect them from ‘this happened and then that and then…’ types of conversations, they eventually become dissatisfied with the entire coaching process.