MEET THE COACH: About Grace
Grace McLaren holds a Master’s in Counseling and Personnel. She is the founder of Aim to Be Coaching, through which she coaches and advises individuals at all stages of life to help them from Point A to Point B. It is a calling rooted in the more than 30 years she spent coaching business executives and teams through her previous company Success Strategies, Inc.
Grace’s vision for expanding and replicating the ability for others to genuinely, appropriately and successfully support those facing darkness grew following her own son’s suicide in 2017. It is her son’s pain and her pain, along with her professional training and experience, that incubated the idea for First Responder Coaching, later renamed to March 4ward (501(c)(3) pending).
Grace was born and raised in Memphis, TN. She has been married to James McLaren for over 20 years. Together, they share three children: one living in Memphis, one living in Atlanta and the other living in Heaven.
In greater depth: My professional qualifications and experiences for this work
I hold a M.Ed. in Counseling and Personnel from the University of Memphis. I have provided executive/business coaching for over 30 years through a company I founded, Success Strategies Inc. Typically, these were in sessions that were 40 hours/week following and working with the same individual. This intense form of coaching covered professional work as well as personal life coaching for areas affecting individuals’ work performance.
I have applied the same coaching model to private coaching sessions through Aim to Be Coaching since 2013. Sessions are not limited to 30, 45 or 60 minutes, but instead the duration and frequency are designed to meet each person’s specific level of risk and need to work them through their darkness. This includes coaching individuals with alcoholism and other substance abuse, suicide attempt survivors, rape victims, victims and perpetrators of childhood and/or domestic abuse, individuals with pornography addictions, and more.
I maintain records on each client and documentation of progress. As one example, one client at the start of a session rated himself a 10 on a 1-to-10 scale for suicide risk, with a plan in place. I coached and counseled him for 7 consecutive hours, and after that 7 hours, he rated himself a 2 out of 10 on the same scale for suicide risk. I provided an additional 13 hours of counseling with him over the course of the remainder of the week. He has the tools to maintain a now-healthy lifestyle and has had no suicide attempts since.
The theories and therapies I incorporate into these coaching sessions include Transactional Analysis (adapted), Client-Centered Therapy, Gestalt, Integrated Family Systems, Reality Therapy, EMDR and DISC.
In addition, my early career included training for and answering the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. I also worked with the government’s Youth Service designing a program to enhance self-esteem among youth, and helped take this program’s group counseling process from statewide to nationwide.
Some have asked if I am a psychologist, a physician, or a licensed social worker; I am not. However, my Master’s in Counseling and Personnel and 30+ year history of coaching in the business and private sectors – along with documentation of measured results from each and every session – is the foundation of my work. The harsh reality of losing my son by suicide led to an adjustment in how I direct my energy and training. I thank you genuinely for your interest and care in learning more about the foundation and goals of establishing this network of individuals equipped to help others March 4ward.