OPM Disability Retirement Law: Thoughts

Can they be controlled?  Or, are they independent conceptual Forms, sort of like Plato’s Ideas of Goodness, Truth, Beauty, etc.?

Aristotle, of course, thought that Plato’s Forms were a bunch of bosh; and so we have two lineages of Western Thought, neatly bifurcated: That of Aristotle’s school, leading linearly to the “scientific” methodology, and Plato’s more “artful”, cinematic approach, involving metaphorical and analogical thought-processes.  Both are legitimate ways of approaching the world, and both involve that ephemeral conceptual constructs designated and labeled as “Thoughts”.

Have you ever obsessed over things?  Worried?  Have thoughts “controlled” you throughout the day?  If you are unable to contain and control them, then aren’t they independent and separate from the “you” which “thinks” them?  Have you experienced that sensation of an “earworm”, where an unwanted “catchy” tune keeps repeating and looping itself in your mind?

Thoughts are interesting entities; for, they are the foundation of meaning in our lives; guide us in utilitarian ways, as well as in intellectual pursuits not otherwise applicable.  They are the product of worries and anxieties; of dreams and plans; of needs and wants.  They both exist independently, like Plato’s forms, and in controlled disciplines, like Aristotle’s logical analysis.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, here is a thought: Consult with a Federal Attorney who specializes in OPM Disability Retirement Law, and let the worries of your health take the priority they deserve, by moving forward beyond your Federal or Postal career, thereby taking “hold” of your thoughts and applying them for the virtue of your own good.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
Lawyer exclusively representing Federal and Postal employees to secure their Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

 

OPM Disability Retirement Law: The Grand Plan

It would certainly be nice if we all possessed one — set in stone, written and accompanied at our birth, mapping out our future and showing each of us what steps to take.  Perhaps, some would interpret such a fantasy as one inviting totalitarianism, and a rebellion would be incited based upon the notion that we all should be entitled to liberty — to have the freedom to choose our own destiny.  Yes, but look where that has gotten us.

The “Grand Plan” — that plan of all plans, the roadmap for our lives, the destiny-setting details already fated without our input; now, who wouldn’t want such a treasure trove?  There are, indeed, some individuals who seem to possess and follow such a map, while the rest of us struggle to “find our way” or to “know what to do”.  The world is full of individuals who fall in the category of “undecideds”.  We refer to them with euphemisms like, “He is a late bloomer”, “She’s taking off a year to get her bearings”, or “He just hasn’t found himself”, etc.

To paraphrase a character from an old movie, “I can’t even figure out how to use the can opener; how am I to know what to do with the rest of my life?”  As an old Chinese proverb states, “The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step”.  Take life in increments; begin with small projects and build upon them.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who have encountered medical conditions which have become an impediment to “The Grand Plan”, you may want to consider filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management under FERS.

Each of us has a contribution to make; each of us has plans for the future; but when a medical condition necessitates a Federal or Postal employee to alter or modify that “Grand Plan” of a career, you may need to consider Federal Disability Retirement as an added feature of that Grand Plan which never appeared when the birth certificate was first written.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
Lawyer exclusively representing Federal and Postal employees to secure their Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

 

OPM Disability Retirement under FERS: Staying the Course

Sometimes, such a strategy can lead to success.  Despite facing obstacles or criticism, the strategic decision to remain steady and unwavering from one’s original plan can successfully result in meeting the original objective or goal.  More often than not, however, a slight variation deviating from such a decision to “stay the course” when some sense of adaptation and malleability is called for, is the better methodology to adopt.

“Staying the Course” is allegedly a showing of dedication to purpose, an unwavering capacity to ignore criticism and a steadiness of deliberation.  It can also reveal a stubbornness of stupidity.  For, when circumstances call for a change in course, ignoring such circumstances has resulted in great historical tragedies.  Great battles have been won and lost because of a leader’s inability to adapt to changing circumstances, or its opposite in waging the better fight because of an acuity of mind in viewing the need for such adaptation.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who have been “staying the course” in the face of a debilitating medical condition, it is certainly an admirable trait if you are able to stay the course.  However, if there comes a time when the medical condition is no longer compatible with being able to perform all of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, you may want to consider filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS.

To do so, you should contact a FERS Disability Retirement Lawyer and see whether or not “staying the course” might benefit from another oft-used phrase — that of thinking “outside of the box”.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
FERS Disability Attorney

 

Attorney for Federal Disability Retirement Claims: The Whisper of Discontent

Seasons come and go; it is one of those ponderous “throw-away” lines that people utter without much thought, somewhat akin to the customary “hello, how are you” declarative that is stated without a pause as the speaker rushes quickly past without waiting for an answer.

Yes, and there are also winters of discontent — borrowed from the line in Shakespeare’s Richard III, and also, by happenstance, the title of the last novel by John Steinbeck; but more often, it is the whispers of discontent that prevail more pervasively, for “discontent” is not necessarily a lasting emotion, or even one that endures for a season; rather, it is whispered precisely because of its fluctuating characteristic.

We whisper it because we know that, like seasons and emotions, time may heal and further time will alter it; and others may whisper it because the fleeting nature of it may not stand the test of objectivity.  And when the whispers of discontent turn and become the louder shouts of adversity, we often failed to listen carefully and instead ignored the voices that forewarned of foreboding toils.

Medical conditions have a tendency to provide such preludes, as well.  One often knows well before a doctor tells us, whether and to what extent the chronicity and severity of the condition foretells; and whether and to what extent the impact upon one’s Federal or Postal career will be.

The law concerning Federal Disability Retirement requires that the medical condition must “last at least 12 months” — but that does not mean that one must endure a 12-month period of suffering before filing a Federal Disability Retirement application; rather, that the treating doctor or medical provider must provide a prognosis that the medical condition will last, at a minimum, that length of time.

For the Federal or Postal employee who is considering filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the whisper of discontent comes about with the realization that the medical condition suffered is impacting upon one’s career by preventing the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s job.

Although seasons do indeed come and go, and there may well be winters of discontent, the Federal or Postal employee who hears one’s Federal Agency or the Postal Service whisper utterances of discontent, may deem it advisable to begin to prepare an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, before such whispers become a winter of discontent where the avalanche of a proposed removal becomes initiated.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement: The buttons we believe accomplish

We believe, on faith alone, that pushing a button does the deed; and then we go on with life, and nothing really has changed but the belief in our own self-satisfaction.  It is that virtual world of computers, light switches, garage door openers and even the disc-like appendages to our shirts and sweaters that lead us to conclude that all such contraptions are of equal weight and value.

We see the cause-and-effect of the garage-door opener — of pushing a button and seeing the door slide open, then another push and it reverses course.  We push buttons on the computer keyboard, and with each tap the screen changes, or concludes with the deed completed; and of “buttons” on a shirt or sweater, we appreciate the invention that holds two sides of a separated apparel together to enclose our bodies with a warmth of a material embrace.

What does it mean to accomplish a deed with a mere pushing of a button?

We have been habituated into such thinking, and it is this disconnectedness that allows for society to continue to move “as if”.  It is only when we encounter the counter – belief that all of a sudden the world of buttons begins to sow some seeds of doubt — as when the boss comes and says, “Why haven’t you sent me X” and you respond, “I emailed it to you last week “ (it isn’t quite the same to say, “I pushed the button that accomplished the deed”).  “But I never got it” is the response which prompts you to go back and re-press the button, hoping somehow that doing so a second time will make a difference that the first time did not.

This time, however, just to be doubly sure, you go back and ask your boss whether he received it (not, again, “did my second button-pushing work?”), thus verifying the causal connection that had failed to occur previously.

What made the difference?

Somehow, in the ethereal universe of circuitry and magic we have no clues about, there exists a causal chain that “works” and “accomplishes” deeds — just like the garage-door opener that issues an immediate gratification of causation.  But that all of life would allow for such instantaneous confirmation — and of buttons we think accomplish.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition necessitates a consideration to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the buttons we need to push are many, varied, and long in waiting.

Whether they comprise of the metaphorical “buttons” to get people moving, or of emails that need to be sent, confirmations that require a response — what we do know, throughout, is that the reality of one’s medical condition has a discernible difference both of reality and of urgency when it comes upon the need for causation to occur.

The buttons we think accomplish remain somehow in that “other world” of magic and the unknown; the medical condition that remains is somehow the reality of the “now” that constitutes pain and suffering; and that is why preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement, to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, is of greater importance than the buttons we believe accomplish.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

CSRS & FERS Medical Retirement: The chronic life

The chronic life is the one that burdens; and, yet, does not all of life present a challenge of burdensome trials and persistent provocations?  Or, are there elements within one’s life that makes it feel as if we are merely the donkey for others to place their weight upon, like those pack animals of yesteryears that always looked forlorn and ready to collapse?

Why do some appear “as if” they have not a care in the world, and flit about like in some ballet skipping and hopping, twirling and dancing from one scene into the next, never allowing for the concerns weighing upon like the rest of us?  Is it merely born of attitude, or having a “positive” thought process; or, are some blocked by the concerns of life such that we are always infected with the chronicity of angst and worry?

The democratic manner of a medical condition seems always to be the one factor that is the exception. Medical conditions do not discriminate; they impact everyone in the same manner.  Whether one is a carefree person, a worrier, a person who is serious, or who flits about life without a thought for consequences, the impact of a medical condition cannot be avoided.

There are those who live the chronic life – always meeting one’s obligations; always fulfilling promises; forever planning for the future; and then there are those “others” who seem to care not a twit about such matters.  And yet, whether of the chronic life or of other-hood, when a medical condition begins to impact one’s health, the treatment and response is all the same: and, all the more so, when the medical condition becomes one that is termed “chronic”.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition has been deemed “chronic” in the sense that it will remain with the Federal or Postal worker for a minimum of 12 months, it is time to consider preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS offset.

It may well be that you have lived the chronic life, and that it is “unfair” given the seriousness of how you have lived your life.  Nevertheless, it is the chronic nature of things in general, including the medical condition that now must be attended to, that will have to be dealt with.

But the advantage is this: those who have lived the chronic life often “deal” with the chronic matters of life with greater success, and perhaps that is the reason the Federal or Postal employee who has dedicated his or her service to the Federal Agency or the Postal Service has been well-prepared for this newest fight – against the medical condition – in this chronic of all matters: the medical condition itself.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Conversation of one

Are we the only species which engages in it?  Do we ever see a dog standing aside and participating in such a phenomena?  Or a cardinal pausing in its morning melody of exuberant sing-song in order to address a non-existent other?  And, it isn’t even an artifice or convention for which the actor is being paid, as in an “aside” or a “soliloquy” where private thoughts are spoken aloud for the benefit of the audience, but where others in the drama act “as if” such thoughts are unspoken and shared not.

But we engage in such dialogues of diatribes:  with friends whom we practice in order to share; of spouses concerning the most intimate of matters; of bosses and coworkers to whom we failed to respond at the crucial moment, but now vent by a conversation of one of that which we wished we had said, desired to rebut, and cared to ponder.

The proverbial quip, of course, is that we are “okay” so long as we have such unilateral dialogues; it is only if the imaginary “other” begins to respond, that we then must consider the state of our own sanity.  But such colloquies occur daily, and throughout life; in quiet moments of reflective self-searching; of what we “would” have said, could have uttered, and in retrospective fashion, desired to have conveyed.

The conversation of one is often never shared; once exhaustively vented, it withers away like the ashes from a once-roaring bonfire, consuming all of the human detritus piled in anger, disgust and resentful remorse, then with watchful eyes applauded as the engulfing flames consume the aggregation of the collective angers, hurts and inflicted bruises of a shattered inner self.  It is sometimes the tool in preparation for a necessary confab; or an exchange with a worthy opponent; and where ad libbing without proper preparation is acknowledged to result in likely disaster.

The conversation of one — we have all had them; with parents and siblings; of sons and fathers; and for cardinals who chirp in the morning glory of a dew-filled mist in the obscured world of linguistic artifices constructed upon vacuity of purpose, it is the beauty of a filled universe without the complexities of human drama unfolding, that makes for worth and value.

For the Federal employee and U.S. Postal worker who suffers from a medical condition, however, the need to have that conversation of one is often a prerequisite precisely because medical conditions comprise the most private of concerns, and absolute confidentiality must be adhered to and the strictest of trust kept.

Attorneys have an inviolable rule for trust, confidence and confidentiality, and privacy concerns should never be a question.  At some point, that conversation of one needs to be expanded to include an exchange involving proper medical documentation, the statutory criteria, the legal strategy to pursue, and the content and context of what must be included in order to prepare, formulate and file for an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

Preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through OPM, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, will often begin with a conversation of one, and that is understandable; but if it remains a mere soliloquy, as in a Shakespearean play where each in an audience believes that he or she is the sole soul who heard it, then it will remain merely as the unconquered thoughts of countless past warriors who gave up lives for a cause left in futility, and where the present is never confronted, and the future left unsecured.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Tolstoy unedited

To read his works often entails utilization of descriptive metaphors, such as “tackle”, or “spend the summer” doing it, or even, “It has taken me a year to reach the midpoint”.  To have read Tolstoy’s major works is a kind of initiation into the upper echelons of cultivated sophistication; how many fakes and phonies there are, can only be guessed at, but some would estimate that nearly half of those claiming to have read “War and Peace” or “Anna Karenina” either failed to complete the rite of passage, skimmed or skipped major portions of either or both, or simply studied carefully the Cliff Notes in the secluded corner of nefarious midnight travails.

But consider the original, unedited version; what the Editor of such works must have had to contend with, just to get it sorted, compiled and drafted into a coherence of acceptability — all before the time of computers, cut-and-paste buttons, and leaving aside the untenable temperament of the author for whom suggested changes meant a challenge to a duel and likely emitting as a response a stream of unedited vitriol spiced with torrents of epithets unheard of in polite company.  But even Tolstoy must have known that his own works required further care and attention, like a child soiled and helpless in self-care; that no form of Art — regardless of its egomaniacal source and unmatched brilliance of the narrative creativity — could be stomached without correction, crafting and splicing of untethered verbosity.

Tolstoy, left unedited, would have required greater metaphors than those we already adopt, and perhaps would have been thrown into the dustbin of untranslated works stored in the vast warehouses of uninterpreted voices.  The parody to a life lived, of course, reflects a parallelism which everyone recognizes, but few undertake.  How one lives a life, also, requires constant perfecting, further editing, and persistent splicing.  The unedited version of any life would be left with an undisciplined mess, unfettered calamity and unconstrained egomania of purposeless vacuity.  Meaning can always be discovered in every life, but it is the cultivated perfection of a disciplined self which constitutes the essence of human uniqueness.

But there are interruptions in living, beyond the control of one’s will and fated determinism; a medical condition is one example, and for the Federal employee and the U.S. Postal worker who suffers from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of the Federal or Postal job, preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application becomes of utmost importance.  However, one must take care in preparing, formulating and filing an effective SF 3112A — Applicant’s Statement of Disability — as so many people believe that the Tolstoy format of an unedited diatribe is as effective as the abridged version of a work of Joyce.

There is always a balance and a “middle ground”, whether in Life, Art, or in the effective submission of a Federal Disability Retirement application through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.  Art often reflects Life; Life is too often lived in an unconstrained fashion; but in either case, in preparing an OPM Disability Retirement application, it is important to recognize that Tolstoy unedited is as onerous an undertaking as a Federal Disability Retirement application left unfettered by purpose, application, and the careful compilation of meeting the criteria of law and life itself.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The complexity of human experience

We take for granted much, and dismiss with careless appreciation the residue of crumbs begotten.  The idiom that refers to the final straw which breaks a camel’s back — why does the foreign species have an impact upon a culture which is unfamiliar with such a beast of burden?  Is it that, despite the images produced against the background of pyramids and pharaohs of a bygone civilization, the essence and theme of the proverbial statement resonates, whether replaced by a horse, a donkey or an ox?

The idea that tolerance to, and capacity for, a seemingly limitless weight of workplace bombardment, whether in translated terms of physical endurance or cognitive stress, is encapsulated by that transcendent cultural expression that there is, indeed, an invisible boundary of and for the human experience.

It is complex; the physical deterioration can presumably be witnessed because of the appearance exhibited; but it is the inner psyche and psychological harm, over untold times and lacking of precision of limit, which tests the stress points of fractures barely visible and likely detrimental.  Stress fractures may be subtle and sometimes inconsequential; but the incremental aggregation if left unreinforced will refuse to withstand an eternity of disrepair.

The complexity of human experience begins with the narrative carried by childhood memories; advances in fits and starts during the “difficult” period of transition from innocence to adulthood; and becomes cemented within the casement of early independence, where the spectrum and balance between love and hate, idealism and cynicism, and a mixture of hope denied by reality, coalesce to form the compendium of what the essence of a person becomes.

On that journey of filling the narrative, some become tested by greater or lesser traumas; and whether one ascribes “fault” to actions which result in consequences otherwise foreseeable, the reality is that those experiences encountered mold the character of the human narrative exposed.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition may cut short one’s career in the Federal sector or the U.S. Postal Service, it is the complexity of the human experience which preceded that moment of realization that a medical condition may prevent the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s positional duties, which will determine the future course of actions and lay the groundwork for a brighter tomorrow.

Whether under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the central point of idioms which transcend time, cultures and limitations of perspectives in modernity, is that we refuse to become relegated to a mere statistical footnote by allowing for that last straw which breaks the camel’s back, and instead insist upon allowing for that beast of burden to survive another day, if only to impart some wisdom to a world which no longer recognizes the complexity of human experience.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Medical Retirement: The attic where useless things are kept

As a metaphor, it refers to the mind, whether because of similar spatial location or by analogy of clutter and vacuity (concepts which are not mutually exclusive, for the former does not imply knowledge, whereas the latter is a negation of it).  The common adage, “Out of sight, out of mind”, applies aptly, as it is the last refuge before it becomes refuse, but somehow is kept because a pause, an indentation, a comma extended the effort of a terminal decision.

Perhaps sentimentality pulled the strings of childhood memories, where the deep recesses of warmth and traipsing through cold streams on summer days and laughter in rolling through careless days of yore attached itself to an item too old to value but not useless enough to discard.

Memories have value, too, you know; they just don’t trumpet the monetary gains in a world devoid of feelings beyond the pocketbook.  The childhood delight of walking up into granddad’s attic, where treasures untold would unfold to the limitless imaginations of a time when entertainment knew not the computer screen nor the smartphone, but carved simplicity of flutes, toy soldiers and great battles where valor and victory filled the silent air.

Houses no longer have stairs to reach the heights of that place of refuge, where sadness would find solace in the quietude amongst dusty suitcases and wedding dresses out-of-fashion but for the beaming bride in photographs fading in crinkled corners of brown discoloration.  Now, we merely have a square entrance cut into the ceiling of the top floor.

Somehow, when stairways were erased from the architect’s mind, the disappearance of the physical means to reach that remaining refuge where loneliness entered and the quiet pitter-patter of mice and old men wandered, the timeless period of pause, peace and calm of perpetuity ceased to exist.  The pencil which erases is more than a negation of thought; it is the end of an era which valued time, relationships and the conversation muted beyond the crackling of a winter’s fire.  The attic where useless things are kept; is that why we treat each other so abominably?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, where the medical condition no longer allows for the great extent of productivity previously enjoyed — suddenly, the Federal agency and the Postal Service treats you like the refuse thrown into the attic, but with no stairway to come back down.  No accommodations are found; you are treated like the pause before the trash bin and the comma before the flush of the toilet.

That is why the option exists for the Federal or U.S. Postal employee to prepare, formulate and file for an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

For, in the end, while the attic is indeed the place where useless things are often kept, it is up to the Federal or Postal employee to begin constructing the staircase which was erased by the thoughtless architect who knew not the future plans for a greater tomorrow; and that is precisely why, for all of those bygone years, you kept that old wooden toboggan — to slide down that next hill where childhood memories still enliven.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire