OPM Medical Retirement: Of a World No Longer

One can lament the destruction and non-existence of what once was; or, following upon youth’s folly where memories have not yet formed in order to compare and contrast anything in the past and therefore such lamentations cannot be validated, we can just walk about in ignorance.

As we grow older, we perhaps exaggerate the pleasantries of our past — of a world no longer in existence.

Was it better “back then”?  Obviously, it depends largely upon whose perspective we are seeing the world from.  From the perspective of those classes of individuals who were once oppressed, where discrimination and legally-enforced restrictions of opportunities constituted the mainstay of daily living, perhaps that yearned-for world that is no longer in existence, is the not the preferred opinion.  Yet, even among the previously – oppressed, there is often a nostalgia for the simplicity of days gone by.

“Worlds”, of course, can take on different meanings.  It need not refer to large chunks of civilization’s great epochs; instead, it can be — from an individual standpoint — a person’s own prior period of one’s lifespan.

Thus, for Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who now suffer from a medical condition such that the condition no longer allows for continuation in one’s Federal or Postal career, of a world no longer in existence may be represented by that individual of some distant past who was vibrant, healthy and able to take on the world.  That is a world which no longer exists, because of a medical condition which will not go away.

Contact an OPM Disability Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, and let not the past — of a world no longer — dominate your present or future comforts.

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.

 

Federal & Postal Worker Disability Retirement Benefits: Time Spent

We have all had that experience — of time spent, perhaps on a project, a hobby, a career goal or some other pursuit — but which resulted in a dead end.  Time spent on something which fails to produce the fruit desired is often considered “wasted time”; or, perhaps something is salvageable, like some lesson learned which can then be transferred to the next pursuance of something worthwhile.

But time spent on something which has no possibility of a positive outcome — like a medical condition which is becoming a chronic, intractable fact of life — becomes a self-defeating pursuit.  For, what is the purpose of such time which is spent?  It is merely to obsess upon a condition of one’s life, to deplore its effects and become despondent over the future.

Time spent upon dead-end thought-processes is merely to waste and whittle the time away for no good reason.

Better to put one’s energies into securing one’s future by preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application under FERS, then to turn one’s energy and time upon another career beyond the federal government.  Contact an OPM Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement, and begin the process of reevaluating the time spent on what you can no longer do, as opposed to spending time on what you might be able to do in the future.

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.

 

FERS Employees Medical Retirement from the OPM: The Insatiable Appetite

This is a world which possesses it; each species is driven by it; the human experience confirms it.  The insatiable appetite is one which wants more, craves more, and is never satisfied.  Technology hints at it; and when Plato discusses the need for a balanced soul, whereby the rational part must govern the appetitive, he understood the nature of the extreme.

We may give lip service to our desire to live a more contemplative, laid-back life, but the plain fact is that the combination of unfettered capitalism and loss of societal boundaries naturally results in the insatiable appetite — of greater stimulation in video formats; of wealth beyond what a single person can consume; of a national debt which cannot have a ceiling; of brutality in war that has no humanity, etc.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition “slows down” the pace of life — by necessity, because there is a natural limit as to what the human body and mind can take — filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS is an acknowledgment that there is a cost to the insatiable appetite.

We cannot go on forever at the frenetic pace which life attempts to force upon us, and instead, we are left with making certain critical decisions: Is the cost of my health worth the job I have?

Contact a disability attorney to discuss the possibility of filing an effective OPM Disability Retirement application under FERS, and begin considering whether the insatiable appetite can at least be confined to the cages of medieval moats and dungeons of the past.

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.

 

Postal and Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Progressive Deterioration

We witness it in others — in our parents; in ourselves, we “feel” it more than see it, as we don’t visually view ourselves in the mirror or observe our own reflections as a third party; and in a community, sometimes we are witness to either ends of the spectrum — of the slow crumbling and abandonment or the “gentrification” of a neighborhood; and in the greater society, the progressive deterioration, of a loss of commonality and retraction of civil behavior, etc.

Progressive deterioration is also how a medical condition “works” — of an incremental, almost imperceptible loss of function, lessening of efficacy, regression of capacity.  Then, there comes a point where such loss no longer allows a person to perform in the same manner as he or she once was capable of.  People compensate in various ways to overcome such deterioration, almost always, however, at a further cost to one’s body or mind.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition has reached a point where the progressive deterioration no longer allows you to perform one or more of the essential functions of your position, contact a disability attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement and consider the option of leaving that phase of your career behind, and moving forward to apply those other functions in a different capacity.

Progressive deterioration is rarely one of complete devastation; not of totality, but of partial loss and lessening.

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.

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Today (pause), and Tomorrow

The parenthetical insertion creates a “real-time” interlude, and the addendum of the grammatical mandate, the unnecessary comma, extends the strained quietude of wanting to engage the sequential utterance.  There is the reality of “now”, which we occupy, fill and exist within, and the expectation of a tomorrow which never exists as a wholeness contained within a specified time period, but merely in anticipated form within the imagination of our cognitive universe.  To this, we can always add “yesterday”, as well, but that is merely of memories passed, reflected in the neurocognitive cellars of stored images.

It is of today and tomorrow which matters for the survival of a species, with yesterday reserved for learned experiences allowing for avoidance of mistakes in order to enhance one’s probability for remaining today and advancing into tomorrow.

Of yesterday, there is nothing that we can do, other than to learn from it and squeeze out the corners of lessons presented.

Of today, there are the problems known, the concerns we have to deal with and the stresses we are forced to tolerate.

And of tomorrow, we have to place into bifurcated boxes of manageable sizes, lest the overwhelming contents spill over to make us all go mad.

For, without the ability and capacity to filter, store and set aside, the extent of problems encountered, stresses envisioned or the troubles tormenting, would be of such quantitative overload as to leave us paralyzed daily.  Of chores left undone, relationships needing tethering, obligations still remaining and work much wanting; where will it all end except in the tombstones of unfinished business?

We are thus stuck in the rut of negation; some, in memories reflected over time enhancing in magnitude and perfection as duration allows for the fissures, wrinkles and ugliness of that once “today” to disappear, such that the retrospective life becomes the paradigm of lost souls.  Or, of those tomorrows yet to come, where we ruminate over troubles that have not yet occurred but we imagine them to become, and crisis that have yet to rear its horrific head, or so the expectations grounded in fear and loathing would have us believe.  Of the before and after, we spend so much time worrying about, and lose sight of the ambiance of today.

Today is what matters; today is the time to plan for tomorrow; today is the moment of applying principles failed by yesterday’s lack of discernment.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who need to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the focus upon “today” is the parachute that will catch the wind stream for tomorrow’s security. And of the past?  Let it remain with memories foretold of positive thoughts and lessons learned for tomorrow, and not of haunting nightmares forgotten but for awakenings in the middle of the night.

Prepare well a Federal Disability Retirement application, and formulate it effectively, and file it today – not tomorrow, and certainly do not ruminate upon yesterday’s failings, as that has already passed without fruition of a future left unseen.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement from Civil Service: Envy without hope

Can a footman in former times, or a scullery maid while scrubbing the floors, experience envy when class structures forbade any hope of advancing beyond?  In days before of rigid demarcations of social and class differentiations, where terms in modernity like “upward mobility” or “moving up the ladder” (have you ever wondered at the condescending connotation of such terms, where “up” is the direction of the movement, as if one were ascending to the heavens, even when such barometric activity often corresponded to moral degradation and sacrifice of one’s character?) were unheard of, was there an inner intimation of envy between watchful eyes by servants who observed the plenitude of decadence and obscene abundance of wasteful riches?

We can, of course, comprehend such sensations of jealousy and comparative desires in our times, for there is no inherent cultural device firmly implanted within the normative constraints, anymore.  As stories abound of the proverbial “rags-to-riches” narratives; and whether by intensive efforts of self-will and do-good stories, or of Wall Street wolves clawing and cheating, or even of the occasional lottery winner who accidentally wandered into a corner mart and took a chance with a last dollar, the conceptual animation within the realm of possibilities exists as to changing one’s circumstances, and with that comes the concomitant feeling or awareness of comparative lack.

But can such a sensation exist in a universe, both in the material realm as well as in the cognitive recesses of one’s imagination and creative thought processes, if one has not a concurrent concept of the possibility, or even the minimal probability, of hoping for an expectation of change?  If there is such hope, how then can there be envy, unless nature allows for an emotion of pure futility where hopelessness can incentivize a pathway towards an unfulfilled nothingness?

Nature is purposive; the teleological sense within us requires that instinctive sensations inherently existent follow the rule of Ockham’s razor, and refuse to allow for futility’s baseless conduct of entrance to nothingness.  Now, one might argue, as Rousseau did, that evils created by society’s influence beyond man’s natural innocence while in the state of nature, engendered by malevolent devices surfacing as appendages upon convoluted addendums not otherwise found except in complex civilized settings, go counter to such arguments; and, certainly, just as H.G. Wells and all dystopian writers since, and others such as Jules Verne possessed imaginations beyond the societal constraints imposed upon the creative mind, and so one might still be able to project such negative feelings without hope or expectations.

Again, however, it would be one based upon a deep chasm of futile exchanges.  That is the question and concern that the Federal employee or U.S. Postal worker must contend with, when a medical condition begins to prevent the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal position.  Can the Federal employee or U.S. Postal worker project into the future, a life without the chosen career to keep one occupied, and still remain happy?

Envy is the killjoy of distracted minds, and hope is the antecedent nectar that allows for poverty and discontent to continue.  For the Federal employee or U.S. Postal worker, however, it may not be a question of envy without hope; rather, it is often just a pragmatic choice compelled by circumstances of chronic and debilitating medical conditions, and the hope resides in the promise that a Federal Disability Retirement application, filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, will be approved and allow for the Federal or Postal employee to focus upon the priority of a future not without hope – that of regaining one’s health, stamina and capacity to regain one’s equilibrium.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Disability Retirement from Federal Government Employment: Imprisoned souls

Do we immediately know of the figurative sense of such a concept?  As the Medieval times of dark, dank and dire dungeons no longer house the tortured detritus of human excrement cast aside upon the nod of displeasure noted by a King, a Prince or a scorned Court of Royal Courtier, so the immediate presumption is that such a term must encompass some cognitive obstacle or encircling of a mind otherwise in agony.  And what of the second term in the concept – does it denote something separate and apart from the whole of a human figure – that essence of a person that tells us that there is something beyond an amalgamation of neurotransmitters and physical presence such that the entity is distinguishable from an amoeba, a flower or those closest of cousins, the chimpanzee?

When a person is looked upon with empathetic concern, is it the image of the individual that gives rise to the sensitivity, or the soul that is embattled within the confines of the exoskeleton that defines the profile like the shadow of an image one sees of a person standing against the lamplight in the dark of night?

When a scream is emitted from the depths of a human uttering, of the physical intonation and shrill cries reverberating through the caverns of a mouth widened in anguished turmoil, do we reach out to provide comfort merely to the physical shape and form of a human being because we can relate to an entity so closely recognizable as that which is reflected in the mirror of our daily lives, or is there that “something” which theologians continue to haunt us with, that transcends the superficial appearance of sense impressions that is discussed from ages foregone, from Plato’s Forms that constitute the “real” reality beyond the appearance of things, and the clinically antiseptic explanations of Hume’s Empiricism that provides a foundation of separation and divide that laid the groundwork for the future of Existentialism a century or more hence?

We are, all, in a general sense, imprisoned souls anguishing in the turmoil of daily angst, but for the Federal employee and U.S. Postal worker who must also contend with a medical condition, such that the medical condition is about to cut short a promising career, the future is often viewed from a bleak perspective, and the daily harassment from Supervisors and Managers only exacerbates the troubled lives we must all manipulate and maneuver through.  Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is not an easy process; it may be, however, the only option left and available for the Federal or Postal worker who can no longer perform all of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal position.

In that sense, the Federal or Postal worker who is left with the best option available – of preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through OPM – is considered an imprisoned soul, for it is not only the medical condition that impacts upon the choices left in life’s trials and challenges, but the constraints and curtailments one self-imposes by agonizing over one’s future as he or she steps forward in trying to maneuver through a complex administrative process.

How to free one’s self?  By simply acting; by moving forward, even if the future is somewhat unknown and uncertain; for, in the end, it is movement itself that distinguishes the difference between life, imprisoned souls, and deadened entities that merely survive.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire