Bloomfield, Harold H. 1944-

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BLOOMFIELD, Harold H. 1944-

PERSONAL: Born October 8, 1944, in New York, NY; son of Max (an accountant) and Fridl (Waldman) Bloomfield; married Sirah Vettese, 1982 (marriage ended). Education: University of Pittsburgh, B.S. (cum laude), 1965; State University of New York, Downstate Medical Center, M.D. (with honors; public health and psychiatry), 1969. Religion: Jewish. Hobbies and other interests: Tennis, swimming, basketball, travel.

ADDRESSES: office—1011 Camino del Mar, Suite 234, Del Mar, CA 92014.

CAREER: Psychiatrist and educator. Kaiser Foundations Hospital, San Francisco, CA, intern, 1969-70; Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, psychiatric resident, 1970-73; Institute of Psychophysiological Medicine, El Cajon, CA, director of psychiatry, beginning 1974; in private practice of psychiatry, psychotherapy, and executive coaching until 2003. Maharishi International University, Fairfield, IA, professor of psychiatry, beginning 1974; Union Graduate School, adjunct professor of psychiatry; Age of Enlightenment Center for Holistic Health, San Diego, CA, director; mental health consultant to West Haven Board of Education, West Haven, CT, 1972-73.

MEMBER: American Psychiatric Association, San Diego Psychiatric Society.

AWARDS, HONORS: David Berger Award, 1978; Golden Apple Award, 1982; Theodor Geisel Book Award, 1999; Medical Self-Care Book of the Year Award; American Holistic Health Association Lifetime Achievement Award.

WRITINGS:

(With M. P. Cain, D. T. Jaffee, and Robert B. Kory) TM: Discovering Inner Energy and Overcoming Stress, introduction by R. Buckminster Fuller, Delacorte (New York, NY), 1975.

(With Robert B. Kory) Happiness: The TM Program, Psychiatry, and Enlightenment, Dawn Press, 1976.

(With Melba Colgrove and Peter A. McWilliams) How to Survive the Loss of a Love: Fifty-eight Things to Do When There Is Nothing to Be Done, Leo Press (New York, NY), 1976.

How to Enjoy the Love of Your Life: Over 100 Ways to Enrich Your Love Life, Doubleday (New York, NY), 1979.

(With Robert B. Kory) The Holistic Way to Health and Happiness: A New Approach to Complete Lifetime Wellness, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1980.

(With Robert B. Kory) Inner Joy: New Strategies to Put More Pleasure and Satisfactions in Your Life, Wyden Books, 1980.

(With Leonard Felder) Making Peace with Your Parents, Random House (New York, NY), 1983.

(With Leonard Felder) The Achilles Syndrome: Transforming Your Weaknesses into Strengths, Random House (New York, NY), 1985, published as Making Peace with Yourself: Turning Your Weaknesses into Strengths, Ballantine (New York, NY), 1996.

(With Sirah Vettese and Robert B. Kory) Lifemates: The Love Fitness Program for a Lasting Relationship, New American Library (New York, NY), 1989.

Love Secrets for a Lasting Relationship, poetry by Natasha Josefowitz, Bantam (New York, NY), 1992.

(With Robert B. Kory) Making Peace in Your Stepfamily: Surviving and Thriving As Parents and Stepparents, Hyperion (New York, NY), 1993.

(With Robert K. Cooper) The Power of Five: Hundreds of Five-Second to Five-Minute Scientific Shortcuts to Ignite Your Energy, Burn Fat, Stop Aging, and Revitalize Your Love Life, Rodale Press (Emmaus, PA), 1995.

(With Peter McWilliams) How to Heal Depression, Prelude Press (Los Angeles, CA), 1996.

(With Mikael Nordfors and Peter McWilliams) Hypericum and Depression: Can Depression Be Successfully Treated with a Safe, Inexpensive, Medically Proven Herb Available without a Prescription?, Prelude Press (Los Angeles, CA), 1996.

(With Robert K. Cooper) How to Be Safe in an Unsafe World, Crown (New York, NY), 1997.

Healing Anxiety with Herbs, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 1998.

(With Philip Goldberg) Making Peace with Your Past: The Six Essential Steps to Enjoying a Great Future, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2000.

(With Philip Goldberg) Making Peace with God: A Practical Guide, J.P. Tarcher/Putnam (New York, NY), 2002.

Contributor to books, including What Is Meditation?, edited by J. White, Anchor, 1974, and Scientific Research on the Transcendental Meditation Program: Collected Papers, Volume I, edited by D. W. Orme-Johnson and J. Farrow, Maharishi International University Press, 1975. Contributor to Behavior Therapy, Psychotherapy, Medical Dimensions, and other journals.

ADAPTATIONS: Healing Anxiety with Herbs was adapted as an audiocassette by Harper Audio, 1998.

SIDELIGHTS: Harold H. Bloomfield is a psychiatrist and educator who has written and/or coauthored over twenty books on the topics of emotional healing, self-help, and natural health.

Bloomfield is a true believer that humans need to find inner peace in order to function successfully in the world. This belief prompted a series of psychology books about making peace with certain areas of one's life. In Making Peace with Your Parents, Bloomfield contends that our relationship with our parents affects all other relationships in our life. He said in an interview for U.S. News and World Report, "Ninety percent of people say they have an incomplete relationship with at least one of their parents." He went on to explain, "If we are carrying around regrets and resentments from childhood, it blocks our capacity to love and be loved." In a book he wrote with Philip Goldberg, Making Peace with Your Past, Bloomfield argues that if one has experiences in life that have been unprocessed, human suffering will inevitably result. He then offers techniques for self-exploration using meditation, writing, and guided imagery. A Publishers Weekly critic called this book "intelligent" and "sensitive."

In a similar theme, Bloomfield published Making Peace with God: A Practical Guide in 2002. Both he and coauthor Philip Goldberg were inspired to write the book by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the founder of Transcendental Meditation. In Making Peace with God the authors include anecdotes and personal stories from various religious sources. Steve Young in Library Journal explained that Bloomfield and Goldberg "advocate a psychologically sensitive and highly syncretistic personal faith for the religious and nonreligious alike." Bloomfield also wrote Making Peace with Yourself and Making Peace with Your Stepfamily: Surviving and Thriving As Parents and Stepparents.

Teaming up with security and protection specialist Robert Cooper, Bloomfield published The Power of Five: Hundreds of Five-Second to Five-Minute Scientific Shortcuts to Ignite Your Energy, Burn Fat, Stop Aging, and Revitalize Your Love Life in 1995. An offshoot from a series of seminars the two men conducted, this book instructs readers on how to completely revitalize and change their lives using brief exercises which range from attitude adjustments to energy management to diet and exercise. All the exercises are backed with scientific references, which lend credibility.

Bloomfield counsels on how to develop what he calls "a strong sense of personal safety" in his 1997 book How to be Safe in an Unsafe World. Coauthored again with Robert Cooper, the book offers strategies to cope with conflicts in life that involve safety and happiness. The authors discuss terms such as "safety intelligence" and "emotional safety" and instruct readers on how to attain both. A Publishers Weekly critic commended, "From muggings to domestic abuse, this book offers an uncomfortable yet necessary and thorough education in personal safety."

In 1973 Bloomfield became one of the first U.S. psychiatrists to qualify as a teacher of Transcendental Meditation, after studying with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. He subsequently used Transcendental Meditation techniques in conjunction with medical and psychiatric techniques in dealing with his patients. After many years in private practice, Bloomfield retired from the practice of psychiatry in 2003.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

periodicals

Booklist, February 15, 1993, Mary Carroll, review of Making Peace in Your Stepfamily, p. 1016; December 1, 1994, Ray Olson, review of The Power of Five, p. 634.

Library Journal, April 1, 1985, Kay O'Connell, review of The Achilles Syndrome, p. 146; March 1, 1993, Linda Beck, review of Making Peace in Your Step-family, p. 95; May 15, 1997, January Adams, review of How to Be Safe in an Unsafe World, p. 88; June 1, 2000, Susan E. Burdick, review of Making Peace with Your Past, p. 168; March 15, 2002, Steve Young, review of Making Peace with God, p. 85.

Los Angeles Times, June 13, 1985, Roselle M. Lewis, review of The Achilles Syndrome, p. 20; July 27, 1998, p. 4.

Publishers Weekly, August 5, 1983, review of Making Peace with Your Parents, p. 76; February 22, 1985, review of The Achilles Syndrome, p. 147; August 10, 1992, review of Love Secrets for a Lasting Relationship, p. 63; December 5, 1994, review of The Power of Five, p. 74; April 28, 1997, review of How to Be Safe in an Unsafe World, p. 63; June 5, 2000, review of Making Peace with Your Past, p. 81.

U.S. News and World Report, May 21, 1984, interview with Bloomfield, p. 47.