Latest / Far & Familiar / (Pt 1) What Kenya Taught Me About Comfort Zones, Open Doors, and Saying Impossible Things Out Loud
Transcript
- Britt Fisher: Hey friends, welcome to part one of the pilot episode of the Far and Familiar Podcast, where I am sharing what Kenya taught me about comfort zones, open doors, and saying impossible things out loud. This episode will challenge and inspire you, and it might even leave you wanting to hop on an airplane, which I am here for. So without further ado. Let's do this. Welcome to Far and Familiar, the podcast about faith, biblical hospitality, and courageous adventure for Christian moms who are ready to step outside of their comfort zones and start fully living. If you find yourself feeling exhausted, overwhelmed, or uninspired in your everyday life, you found the right place. Friend, you were not made to play it safe and operate in survival mode. You were made to live with eyes up and doors thrown open, chasing the adventure and abundant life God has for you. I'm your host, Britt Fisher, Jesus follower, mama of four, and someone who believes a full dinner table and a passport full of stamps are forms of worship. I've spent years traveling the world with my family, opening our home, and navigating what it actually looks like to live a life outside of my comfort zone. And this podcast is everything I and other mamas who have gone before me have learned along the way. I am so glad you're here. Let's dive in. Hi, friend. Welcome to the very first ever episode of Far and Familiar. I am so excited you are here. Honestly, I have been dreaming about this podcast for a very honestly almost embarrassingly long amount of time. And the fact that you are listening right now means everything to me. It is such a pinch-me moment, and I just cannot thank you enough, truly. if you don't know me, I am Britt Fisher. I am your host. I am a daughter of Christ. I am wife of almost 17 years to a wonderful man who is a holistic family physician. I am a mama of four. I have three wild, rambunctious boys and one precious little girl. And our family is built both by birth and the beautiful gift of adoption. We live in Oklahoma, which I absolutely adore. I've lived here since the first grade. but honestly, my heart has always had one foot out the door, or maybe one foot on an airplane would be a better way to describe it. And I think I know exactly where that started. my mom grew up as a missionary kid in Haiti and Europe. And some of my earliest memories are sitting at her feet or sitting at my grandmother's feet, listening to their stories. The people, the places, the way God showed up in the middle of it. That's where my wonder less began. Not only in an airport, because my dad actually did work for American Airlines growing up. So that was definitely part of it. But beyond the airport, it really truly began at a kitchen table in the stories of women who had seen the world and loved it well. These days, I am a world traveler, a hospitality lover, and a completely unashamed coffee nerd. my friends call my house cafe Brit. My door is always open, the coffee is always superb, and there is always room at my table for one more. That ministry of presence around my table is truly one of the greatest joys of my life, and it is woven into everything you will find on this show. Okay, so here is what it's actually going to look like week to week around here. Some weeks we are going to get really practical about hospitality, how to open your home when it is nowhere near Pinterest ready, because Lord knows it never really will be. Especially if you have kiddos in the home. How to build a table people actually want to come back to. some weeks we're gonna talk about family adventure, real trips, real budgets, real kids. And some weeks it's gonna be stepping outside of your comfort zone in faith with practical evangelism and saying an obedient yes to the scary thing that God is calling you to. And you're gonna hear not just from me, but from other mamas who are out here doing it, who are opening their homes to family, to friends, to neighbors, to foster kiddos who are packing up and moving overseas to follow God's call for their lives, who are starting businesses on a prayer. Or are just deciding to stop waiting until life feels easier to actually start living it. Every single week it will be rooted in the gospel because I believe the most ordinary life becomes extraordinary when we are willing to live it with our eyes up, pointed at Christ, and our doors thrown open. Today though, for our first ever episode, I want to tell you guys a story that I believe is the heart and embodiment of everything that this podcast is about. This story contains elements of courage, adventure, hospitality, all in the light of the gospel, and it begins in Kenya. before we get into it though, if you are enjoying this podcast so far, would you go ahead and hit subscribe right now? I do not want you guys to miss out on all of the incredible things I have planned for this podcast season. I have the first 30 some odd episodes already outlined. I have interviews set up. It is going to be truly such a place of encouragement and inspiration, and I'm just so excited to share it with you. And then if you were listening on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever else you listen, would you take 30 seconds of your time and leave a review? This is truly the most important thing that you can do to support the podcasts that you love And the podcasters that you love, it really only takes just a few seconds of your time. and it is genuinely how other women who need this show find it. So thank you so much again for being here. And let's dive into the story about Kenya. Okay, so this story begins as all good stories do, and it begins with a dream. here's the setting. My husband is at this time in his medical residency. So he has graduated medical school. He is pursuing the calling that God has placed on his life as a family physician, and he is doing so at the most incredible Christian family medicine residency program in Tulsa, Oklahoma. In his image, We were so blessed to be a part of that program. And every summer they would have a summer retreat, basically an opportunity to go get continuing medical education and to kind of meet in community with other physicians that are living out the gospel through their ministry of medicine. And so we're at this summer retreat. And in addition to meetings and trainings and community events for the physicians themselves, they also really Believed in building community for the spouses and the families. So I am at kind of like a wives luncheon of sorts. And they had one of those games where questions are written on small pieces of paper and thrown into a bowl and everyone draws them out. It's kind of a get to know you game. And it comes around to me, I open up my question and the question on my piece of paper says, What are what is one of your like secret hidden dreams that you haven't really told people about or said out loud? at the time, while my husband was pursuing his medical education, I was actively working as a doula and a birth photographer. Birth is truly one of my greatest passions and something I have been so honored to get to participate in. I've attended over a hundred births through the years, and getting to support women in those moments is just so powerful and special to me. And it's something I am not doing heavily right now in my current season of homeschooling for littles. but at the time I was actively attending births regularly, four to six births a month. And While I was actively attending births, my husband was doing the same thing in his medical training. And yet our paths had never crossed in that way. I rarely, because of the nature of a doctor's work, get to see my husband work. you know, HIPAA, all the things. He's behind closed doors. but I had this dream deep down in my heart of somehow being able to attend a birth and support a mama in labor and document her birth. While my husband was the attending physician being her baby catcher. And I had this dream, but I honestly didn't think it was very feasible. just the nature of who my husband's patients were in residency and who the people that were hiring me I wasn't sure it was ever gonna happen, but I decided to say the thing that I really wanted out loud, even if people might think I was a little crazy. Honestly, I was in a group of a bunch of medical people and Sometimes doula's, especially people that attend a bunch of home births, which I had a home birth. I've had birth center births. So we were already a little bit on the fringe, anyways, on that front. But I thought, you what, I'm gonna say the the scary dream out loud anyways. And so I shared out loud that my dream was to do and photograph a birth where my husband was the attending delivering physician. And then we moved on with the luncheon. And everyone else answered their questions. And we had a really lovely speaker. then the luncheon was over. And afterwards, this a really adorable woman, she is now one of my dearest friends, but she was our speaker, and she comes up to me. And the first thing she says to me is, Hi, my name's Vanessa. I can make your dreams come true. And After the initial shock of just hearing that, I'm like, okay, you want to expound upon that for me? And she begins to share what she had already shared some about during her speech, but she is married to a physician who is on mission living in a small village in Kenya, a little village called Capsawar. And she said, We would love to have you come visit us in Capsuar, have your husband come work at this hospital alongside my husband. And I know that you could absolutely support women there. doulas are not a common thing. Women are not even often accompanied by their husbands in labor. And to have your expertise there and presence to support and encourage women in labor, also to photograph their births. Photos were not a very common thing that people got to have taken often in this area of Kenya. She said it would be such a blessing to our community. we would love to have you guys out. And as she's telling me this, you know, my wanderlust and desire like immediately starts bubbling up. But then at the same time, all of the what ifs and the questions and the obstacles start bubbling up as well. One of those objections was the fact that at the time I was a mama to a six-month-old and a three-year-old boy, which I don't know how many of you are in the little years, but goodness, it is a lot of work in those little years. The work changes as they get older, But I had very full hands at the time, and I was not sure what it would look like not just to take a vacation overseas, but to actually move overseas for an amount of time and do daily life and of all places in rural Kenya, which there's more objections. The fact that we were in an area with very little running clean water and limited access to markets and food and safety concerns. Violence was a real issue in the area of Kenya that we were in. my husband ended up seeing a lot of that during his time in the hospital, serving there in the ER. So all of these, obstacles. And then one of the greatest obstacles was just the reality of the funds it would cost to get there. We're in residency, my husband is not earning a doctor's salary. at this point, I have walked away from my full-time job that I had to put in through medical school so that I could serve as a doula. but we were not making a lot of money and we did not have room in the budget to willy-nilly fly overseas. We had done one big international trip as a family before that, when my oldest son was two, before we got pregnant with my second born. And that trip we had saved for for six years. And I knew we would did not have six years to save for this trip. So I knew. That the finances of getting there was going to be an obstacle. But I also knew that if God wanted us there, that He would open the door and that no obstacle or no mountain was too big for him to move. So we decided to jump in anyways. And there's a few things that I want you to hear from the story so far. And the first thing is I want you guys to realize the power of naming your dreams out loud. It is so easy for us to have these desires deep in our heart and kind of hide them, especially the things that feel impossible. Whatever your impossible dream is, a lot of times we harbor those things really close. You know, we kind of hide our cards, so to speak. But there is something so powerful in saying the thing and naming it out loud. Because while your father in heaven knows all of your dreams and goals, he often uses people here on earth and our willingness to be open and obedient to pursue those things, to bring those things to fruition. A friend of mine has often said, pray, but pray with a plow in your hand. Like we have to be willing to do the thing, to step out in faith. And often that is saying the thing out loud. And And my case, the powerful thing of saying my dream out loud is if I hadn't said that out loud, I don't know if my sweet friend Vanessa would have ever come up to me and offered that opportunity for me to know that was a possibility. Because not all of the rotations and things that were offered for my husband to potentially pursue overseas during his medical training would have had that freedom for me to be at the hospital as well. so that was really special. And then the other thing I want you guys to hear is to recognize that whatever dreams that you have in your heart are going to come with resistance. Like there will be resistance, there will be obstacles, there will be challenges. And one of the greatest challenges might be your own fear of what you have to overcome in order to step out and step out in obedience and faith. But I think there is something so powerful from being willing to take that leap of faith. And essentially build the parachute on the way down. years ago, I went skydiving in college, which I actually have like a deep-seated fear of heights. So that is saying something that I was willing to do that. but it was one of those things that I got offered last minute and I didn't even really have time to fully think of it, think, think about it, or to I didn't really have time to even fully think it through. But I knew I had this opportunity in front of me and I felt like I was supposed to do it. And so I went. And I jumped out of the airplane. And so often I think, you know, when it comes to a leap of faith, we want to like trust that we can like step outside of the open doors and step onto firm ground on the other side. But so often our leaps of faith really do feel like jumping out of an airplane. There's there is nothing immediately to catch you as you're going and you are having to trust that the God of the universe is doing what he says and promises he will do, which is to go before us and stand behind us, to hem us in before and behind. And really, you know, sometimes we're building the parachute on the way down, but we're trusting that he's gonna be the one that opens it. And so learning to lean into that journey of faith and that leap of faith, I think is so powerful. And not letting whatever objections or obstacles get in your way when it's something that you truly know that God is calling you to step into. and then what came on the other side of that leap of faith for us was the reality of seeing that dream come true. this was July when this summer retreat was. We ultimately planned our trip for April. That was the timing that worked well. And we got on the airplane, we flew to Kenya, we took a tiny little plane into The village of Eldorett, which then took a car ride two hours into the much tinier village of Capsuar. And there my husband was able to serve alongside the full-time missionaries there. We were able to live there for the entire month of April. we celebrated Easter there. We did Friday night movie and homemade pizza nights. my husband lived on call and received calls at all hours of the night where he walked from our house. Up to the hospital and delivered babies and assisted in surgeries and helped in the ER and prayed with people on their deathbeds, And goodness gracious, what a gift it was. And while I mentioned that he delivered babies, which truly honestly, the mamas are the ones that are doing the delivering, the doctors are just the baby catchers, in my opinion. ultimately, this precious mama Vanessa, she offered to keep my kids multiple times during our month there where I could walk up to the hospital when a mama was in labor and needed support. And I got to serve as a doula. And to this day, one of my favorite photographs I have ever taken is the photo. Of my precious husband holding up this baby girl that this mama had just delivered, and then watching him place her on her mama's chest. It was just so precious and such a privilege and honor to support these women and to document that And to get to see my husband and his element in that way. And while this trip ultimately was instigated by a dream of mine, what was so beautiful about it is that I also got to see dreams for my children come true. having been raised by a missionary kid, I had longed and desired for my children to get the same exposure and experiences to the God of the universe and the world in a way that shows that He is so much greater. And grander than just the God that we experience in America. He's so much bigger than that. And I had wanted my kids to get to see that and have that opportunity to serve overseas and getting to walk those roads with them, to go up to the hospital and deliver treats to the kiddos and the children's ward, all of the different aspects of that. We got to see so much beauty and fruit grow in our children in that season, the fruit of contentment. And also the fruit of courage themselves, stepping into an area that they knew no one. My oldest son has always been someone that new situations, new people, new things, take a little bit more of an adjustment period for him and getting to watch him step out in that. in addition to them getting to see us choose kind of the scary yes and and do the hard thing. And you know, my older kids will still talk about, man, mom, like you. handle those long flights with toddlers and babies and ultimately I love being able to model that for them that being uncomfortable is not a bad thing and that having to live in uncomfortable situations or to have things that feel very inconvenient in life is not a bad thing. And it's actually something that builds a lot of character. And the reality is is that we can encourage our children To lean into those things, but the most powerful way that they learn is by watching our own examples. And we as parents have to be willing to step into those things and to be uncomfortable and inconvenienced ourselves if we want our kids to walk in that. And I just think it's so powerful. Like, what does it teach our children when we actually live like we believe what we say we believe and that we live out and walk out the values that we tell them so often that we value and the character qualities that we're wanting to grow in them, we are willing to grow in ourselves. All right, friends, and just like that, we have reached the end of part one of this powerful story of my family's time in Kenya. I cannot wait to share the second half of the story with you guys in episode two of the podcast. I recorded this all as one giant story time, but it ended up being about 35 minutes, and I really want to keep these episodes. About 20 minutes to keep things as digestible as possible for you guys. So I'm gonna encourage you to go ahead and hop over when you have time to listen to part two of this story where I share to this day what is the most powerful example of radical hospitality that I have ever experienced. This story has truly transformed the way that I view biblical hospitality and that I practice it in my own home. And I cannot wait to share it with you guys. In the meantime, I just want to encourage you guys to keep your eyes up towards Christ and to be bold and throw your doors open this week to whatever it is that He has for you. I will see you in episode two.