Yuri elkaim biography template

Dude…What’s The Deal With Your Eyebrows?

You can’t imagine the fear I felt. What was happening to me? Did this mean there was no truth to what I was teaching? Flooded with fears of my alopecia returning and my business falling apart, I did what any grown man would do: I started secretly using my wife’s makeup to fill in my thinning eyebrows.

I was losing my eyebrows (and other hair) at an alarming rate which drove me to develop a makeup routine, applying my fake eyebrows every morning after I brushed my teeth.

I started toning down my workouts out of fear that my sweat would make my “eyebrows” run. I refused to go swimming with my kids because the water might ruin my makeup. I continued shooting and posting YouTube videos but was in constant fear of being outed as a fraud. It was exhausting.

In fact, although my channel subscribers and followers are awesome, there’s the occasional viewer that would leave some nasty comments like “Dude, what’s the deal with your eyebrows?” or “Do you have cancer or something?”

And in all fairness, who could blame them when my eyebrows looked different from one video to the next.

However, all of that was about to change…

In late 2013, I went to a 4-day personal and business development event in the Dominican Republic. I had no idea what to expect, but I was certainly meant to be there because it profoundly affected my life—for the better. After the first 2 days, I sat down one evening to catch up with my friend Dane.

We had a long conversation about what was happening in our lives. That’s when everything came spilling out. I opened up about everything I was dealing with: my eyebrows, the makeup, and why I was afraid.

I don’t think I had ever been this vulnerable or open about my feelings. Being the amazing person that he is, Dane peered into my soul and worked some kind of magic that touched me at a fundamental level. Something shifted inside of me.

Later that evening, I was having another conversation with a good friend, Fabienne, whom I hadn’t seen for about a year. We were talking about one of the exercises from the event in which we were asked to give away something of value to us…

Most people had brought jewelry and other personal mementos. I couldn’t think of anything to bring that was meaningful to me—other than my children. I didn’t think it would be wise to give them away!

Then, it hit me.

There was only one thing I was holding on to like a baby does a blankie. Any ideas? Take a guess. It was that damn eyebrow makeup. Could I really get rid of it? Could I take off the mask and bare my true self? Deep down inside, I knew the answer.

That evening’s conversation with Fabienne reaffirmed my belief that this was the right thing to do. She reassured me that I was a beautiful person and gave me the courage I needed to take the leap.

I broke down in front of her. I couldn’t keep up my disguise any longer.

I promised Fabienne that the next morning I would be done with the makeup for good, and because my word means everything to me, that’s exactly what happened.

The next morning, I walked straight into the bathroom, picked up the makeup, and chucked it into the trash can. I stared in the mirror at the shiny patches of flesh above my eyes. There was no turning back now.

Anxiously, I left my hotel room and made my way to the beach for a morning yoga session. I felt naked and awkward and kept glancing around to see who was looking at me. Oddly enough, no one really noticed.

I felt weird, but then, it wasn’t like I was wearing a giant scarlet letter A on my chest.

What happened next was pure magic…

As I moved through each position in our yoga session, my body was soothed by the warm morning sun. About halfway through the session, it started raining, even while the sun was shining…

I remember lying on my mat with my eyes closed and relishing the feeling of the warm rain splashing my face. It was so liberating.

After the yoga session, I ran to the ocean with childlike excitement, crashing through the waves and diving headfirst into the salty water. As I swam underwater, time froze. It was like living in slow motion…

When I surfaced, I wiped the water off my face, opened my eyes, and felt more alive than ever before. I was finally free. I felt like I’d just baptized myself in a sense. My true self had finally emerged. I reflected on the fact that all life initially came from the ocean, so it was fitting that, with my first step out of the water, I felt reborn.