Rick McDaniel was raised in Indiana and moved to Canada in 1967, where he earned an MA and Ph. D. in the Literature of the Developing World. He taught at the University of New Brunswick and Saint Thomas University for twelve years before beginning a 27 year career in International Development and Fair Trade with the YMCA. He worked with projects in the Dominican Republic, Belize, Cuba, Mexico, and Honduras.
He is the creator of the YMCA Peace Medallion and founded Cultures Boutique, the first fair trade store in Fredericton, New Brunswick.
Rick is the author and narrator of several video series examining the relationship between developed and developing nations, including the five part 80/20 – A Developing World – distributed by the Canadian Learning Company. He is also the co-author, along with Jim Petrie, of A Two Way Approach to Understanding: Issues in Global Education – published by the New Brunswick Teachers’ Association.
Rick became interested in Zen practice in 1971 and eventually studied with Albert Low of the Montreal Zen Center. He is the author of seven books on the subject. His most recent, Zen Conversations, was released by the Sumeru Press in 2021.
He and his wife, Joan, live in Island View, New Brunswick. They have three children, nine grandchildren, and a great-grand-daughter. Rick hosts the Fredericton Zen Sitting Group which meets weekly in Fredericton, New Brunswick.
Richard Bryan McDaniel 