Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) Disability Law: Life’s Frenetic Pace

Is it any more than in times past?  Without an actual reference point, lacking in contrast to historical contexts, unfounded by knowledge no longer available — is the frenetic pace by which we live any different from previous eras?

Certainly, in times prior to the industrial revolution, before refrigeration was invented, technology as part of our accepted daily lives — the focus was more upon having food sufficient to provide for our daily needs.  In the modern era, the source of food is rarely a problem; rather, if it is a problem, the concern is one of how to afford it.

Access is different from availability.  Technology itself, of course, is always touted as time-savers; that by downloading this “App” or purchasing that gadget, you’ll be left with greater time spent in lazy leisures of accommodated peace and prosperity.  Life’s frenetic pace in modernity, of course, has a price — and that price is often the cost of one’s health because of the stress we are under.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition no longer allows for continuation at the frenetic pace by which we live, filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS may be the best option to take.

Contact a Federal Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and begin the process of paring down the frenetic pace of life.

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 Disability Retirement from the OPM: Failures

When they come, we tend to overemphasize them.  When they become a rarity, we believe far too grandly in our own abilities.  It is always important to maintain a balanced perspective — what Aristotle would have termed the “middle way” or the Golden mean.  To avoid the extremes is a difficult path to follow.

Failures come into our lives within a context of a society which is intolerant of them.  We root for the winning team and barely recognize the fabulous plays of the defeated one; an individual can perform exceptionally well throughout, but if in the last minute, the final few moments, or in the very last second of that performance, the prize is overtaken by another — all of that effort is deemed a failure and for naught.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, OPM Disability Retirement might have to be considered.

Perhaps you had a long and extended career or, maybe you have barely met the minimum time-in-service requirement of 18 months of Federal Service.  In either event, you have met the threshold for filing a FERS Disability Retirement application, and whether of a long and fruitful career or of a short impact within a specified timeframe, filing a Federal Disability Retirement application is not an indication of a failure to be distraught over, but merely a recognition that it is time to move on to the next phase of a future yet bright and hopeful.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement under FERS: First Steps

Why are first steps so significant?

When a toddler takes his or her first steps, we applaud, celebrate with loud amusement and put forth encouragement and “positive feedback” to the momentous episode which, days later, weeks hence and years post, we don’t even consider it to be of significance and yawn with boredom at something which previously had been touted as relevant.

First steps — what is the relevance?  Is it because, upon those initial and tentative ambulatory movements is set the foundation for future success?  For, if confidence begins with the initial and tentative first steps, is it any wonder that once the foundation is set with concretized stability, the remainder becomes a monotony of repetitious boredom?

First steps are always important in order to create the firm foundation for future and further steps, and that is why 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, it is important to consult with an attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law.

First steps in preparing, formulating and filing an effective FERS Disability Retirement application is important in putting together a “whole package” that includes medical evidence, legal arguments that are pertinent and relevant, and a persuasive presentation to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management in order to enhance the chances of an approval at the First Stage of the complex, administrative process.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Medical Retirement Legal Representation: Future uncertainty

It is a peculiarly human endeavor to reflect upon and ruminate; to consider that which has not yet occurred, and to worry about it, turn it over, consider the options, become so ensconced in the details of that which is still yet to become, if at all, and to will anxiousness and even harm one’s health over it.

Does the dog that one has known for many years engage in such conceptual angst, and project one’s self towards a time yet to become?  Well, yes — there can be a similar sense of anticipation; of prefatory behavior in response to an approaching hour.  If, on every Sunday at noon a tremendous noise is heard, dogs and other animals can be ‘trained’ into becoming anxious for several hours before the event, and act accordingly.

Is that merely an inculcated imprint, or is there some lengthy thought process — reflection, rumination or anticipatory consternation — involved in the anxious behavior exhibited?  Is there a distinction to be made in the manner in which human beings behave towards future uncertainty, or is the difference merely one of degrees?  Does our capacity towards an insular universe, self-contained within thoughts and boundless tangential roads that lead to greater depths of despair and self-inflicted despondency differ from the trained responses as exhibited by other species?  Or, is our capacity simply of “more”, and the extent of our means merely one of exponential exhibitionism?

Future uncertainty — what is it?  Is it a learned response or a human peculiarity of untold evolutionary need?  How does one engage in it, and are there better coping mechanisms than others?  Does life’s experiences grant any reprieve, or are we all subjected to its devastating effects?  Do the wealthy experience it in the same manner, or does it merely take an extremely selfish personality — one that cares nothing for others and thus feels no sense of obligation in forestalling any belief in future doom that may befall family members — to avoid the angst of foreboding tides?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who have that sense of future uncertainty because of a medical condition that has begun to prevent the performance of one or more of the essential elements of one’s job, the obvious antidote to such feelings is to prepare, formulate and file 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.

Yes, the future may appear uncertain at this moment; yes, the sense of not knowing gives a recognition of anxiousness that seems never-ending; and no, filing a Federal Disability Retirement application is not the answer to all problems presented.  However, it is at least a start — to refocusing one’s attention to the priorities of life’s foundational precepts: of health and in securing some semblance of a future yet to be determined, but to be anticipated not with a foreboding sense of gloom, but of a tomorrow that may yet promise a day after.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Giving lip service

What does it mean to merely give “lip service”?  Ultimately, it is the hypocrisy of committing to words the sincerity of inaction.  In other words, it is merely the utterance of words, with nothing to follow.  This is a society that speaks much, and does little.  We give lip service to the braggadocio of being a productive society, yet, concurrently admit to the massive loss of the manufacturing sector of our country.

Can a country whose primary essence is built upon a “service industry”, actually declare itself to be “productive”?  Can we truly instill fear and dread upon our enemies while simultaneously confessing that no ground troops will be deployed?  Can unmanned drones win wars?  Can we actually claim to have hundreds of “friends” if we have never met them, never been irritated by the subtleties of undesirable traits and personalities, yet have spats by mere tapping of the fingertips on a keyboard?

It is little wonder that we are a society of mere utterances, less action, and where words pile upon more words to voluminously detail the insincerity of the greater cumulative mountain of meaningless words.  Lip service is to promise the world and leave the scraps of society with mere leftovers.

Admiral Yamamoto was only half-right when he feared that, by successfully launching the sneak-attack upon Pearl Harbor which brought the United States into the Second World War, he had inadvertently awoken a sleeping giant; for, generations later, who remembers the words of the victors in the history of fallen empires, but the faint snoring of the giant gone back to sleep?

It is lip service we give, today, and the same we receive in return.  In a universe where language is both the essence of life, as well as the primary barrier to living it, the duality of clashing worlds where virtual reality dominates the phenomenology of currency, it is little wonder that we can, as a species, survive even a day.

What other animal turns to the technology of texting in the midst of an endangered life?  Of embracing an impotent shield of linguistic panorama when threat to safety prevails and calls upon the urgency of action?  Do other predators – and we are one, despite our denials by protecting endangered species who mirror our own violent history – scream when attacked, or do they growl with aggressive energy to compel our enemies to take heed?

Beware of the lip service, especially by those who would do us harm.

For Federal and Postal employees who begin the process of preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the inclination is to be “fair” and to inform one’s Federal Agency or the U.S. Postal Service of one’s “intentions” concerning the process; but such information prematurely disseminated may come back to haunt, and one must always be wary and cautious of inane platitudes from coworkers, supervisors and managers who are empowered to harm.

For, the passing comment made, and returned with the innocuousness rising to the level of inaction in the lip service of those who pretend to be friendly, may come back to haunt with an administrative sanction which does some actual harm in this world of virtual reality in a language-filled emptiness.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement under FERS/CSRS: Of bad people

Is there any good in people, anymore?  Is it even relevant to distinguish between “good” and “bad”?  Yes, yes – I know; it is a devious thing to entitle a piece with one concept, then begin the discussion by embracing its antonym – a device often used by newspapers, periodicals, and short story writers of the dubious set and genre of unfashionable alternatives.  But more to the point:  in a universe and culture where moral judgments are no longer acceptable, and where equivalence of distinctions have been concretized except by religious zealots and society’s cultish outcasts, can the contradistinctions between the two have any significance or relevance for conceptual paradigms incommensurate with prior such models (to borrow a well-worn phrase by Thomas Kuhn) in order to retain any meaningful posit?

There is an inherent acknowledgment that if we ascribe a negative principle or connotation to a word, that two things must necessarily denote a contingent precedent:  First, that it is distinguishable from everything else in the universe (otherwise, if it cannot be, then everything becomes nothing, and therefore loses its efficacy of meaning); and Second, that its opposite must embrace an aura of equally virulent affirmation, lest the antonym be nothing more than a synonym of choice.

But if “goodness” is a mere societal convention constructed in the artifice of false religious histories, where idols, gods and angels once occupied now have formed a continent of mythologies no longer believed in but for those quaint societies in outlands visited by tourists who purchase trinkets for show and Instagram opportunities, then being “bad” cannot have any ascription of meaningful prose, anymore.

“Goodness” meant something, at one point; there were common threads throughout, and societal values could agree implicitly, without vocalized necessitation of explanatory expositions, and the questioning itself would bring quizzical looks of suspicion and concern, not only for the finite soul for mortality’s sake, but because to query of such self-evident devices was to presume a sort of insanity manifested against the tides of normalcy.

In modernity, of course, the antithesis is accepted:  to make a moral judgment is to be intolerant, and that is the greatest crime of all.  Yet, that in and of itself is an anomaly, because as sins are presumed to be no longer fashionable because of the Biblical context surrounding, so “good” and “evil” (or “badness”) are no longer acceptable terms.  We cannot judge, because judging requires a prerequisite of an intolerant nature, and tolerance is the reflective definition of goodness in modernity.  So, we must suffer evil in silence, and remain neutral as to the angels who visit us when misfortune arrives.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who must suffer through the employment arena knowing the hogwash of neutrality where we never judge and never appear intolerant, we witness the height of hypocrisy in the behavior of the “good” people against those with medical conditions and disabilities.

And so we have to prepare an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, because to remain at the Federal Agency or U.S. Postal Service would, again, turn the conceptual artifices upside down, where the “good” have been deemed no longer so, and the “bad” are those who seek to be accommodated, or stick around too long and irritate the “good” people of the Federal Agency or the U.S. Postal Service, which is a “bad” thing that “good” people should not be allowed to do, because it is a good bad thing in a bad good world.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: The fading sheen of respect

It happens over time; and, perhaps, in marriages where discovery of once-cute characteristics become irritants, when tics of unique personalities transform into obstacles, and the surface beauty of looks gradually morph into the reality of superficiality of egocentric psychosis.  But, then, a career is like a marriage, but lacking the intimacy of misguided warmth.

Disdain – does it develop instantaneously?  Does the remark of condescension and arrogance, cutting into the soul by drips and drabs, meter the suspicion that something is amiss, that someone has been whispering untold gossips of tidbits and tadpoles still swimming but lacking the croak of the frog disguised, and never to be kissed or metamorphosed into a princess of fantasy and fairytales?

When and how does loss of respect occur?  Is it in incremental clutches of shifting sand dunes, like the mirage which appears and when we reach it with thirst and desire, disappearing without but a trace of salivating want?  The scornful expression of familiarity; is there anymore a depth of intimacy the closer we become with one another, or does the essence of human depravity prevent such soul mates to bond?

Have we become cynical, to the extent that we no longer recognize the essence of human goodness, and instead – as the Darwinian paradigm of pure materialism has pervaded every crevice of our thoughts and beliefs – we have all accepted the maxim that life is but an insignificant blip on a linear scale of colossal vacuity, where the speck of life is but a mere comma in the breath of the vast universe, and how man is not just below the angels, but nothing more than mere fodder for predators to devour?

Does relevance, significance, and purpose of living – that composite and aggregation of teleological meaning – no longer apply in a world where essence is defined by material possessions and the quantitative quality of crassness of existence?

It is often asserted that respect is earned, not by mere ascription or claim to status, but by merit of behavior and ascension to knowledge; but in this day of modernity when all opinions are of equivalent moral value, and those with megaphones can drown out the quietude of truth and logical validity, the sheen of respect for all has been diminished by the mere devaluation of the essence of human worth.

A sheen upon an object is cared for and vigorously attended to; the fading of it means that the owner or caretaker has allowed it to slowly, incrementally and progressively deteriorate; and these things always lose their brilliance over time.  Not in a day, a month, or even over the course of a year, but by subtle carelessness of constant neglect.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition has impacted upon the ability and capacity to shine forth like those days of yore when energy was unmitigated, future hope was always a reminder, and where the brilliance of each hour was still to come, the fading sheen of respect shown both by the agency one works for and the coworkers’ company one cherishes, may be on the downturn.

If so, that Federal or Postal employee may want to consider preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, if only because such loss of respect is reflective not merely upon the personhood of you, but upon the essence of human degradation.

In many ways, “moving on” to the next chapter of life beyond being a Federal or Postal employee is a step towards maintaining and guarding the residue still remaining of that respect which once was, but now fades in the sheen of devalued and obscured images of a person who once was, still is, but is seen as merely an object of derision, and not that worthy employee who forms the essence of a past now forgotten.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement: “The Work Of 10 People”

We have all heard the boast:  “I do more work in an hour than most people do in a week”; “I earn the wages of 10 people before breakfast”; “I do twice the work for half the pay”; and on and on.  The plain fact is that each individual, no matter the self-interested tropes of inane contradictions, performs the quantitative and qualitative labor of that singular effort, and no more.

Some may meet greater production quotas; others may appear to make significantly faster headway into concluding projects and assignments; but the boast of self-worth is nothing more than a comparative analysis which ultimately fails when proper relative proportionality is conducted; there are always others whom you have not met, hardly know, or will likely never encounter, whose competence outshines the vast and endless ego of your own self-assessment.

Where does such self-delusion originate?  And are there more such self-assurances in modernity than times of yore, when the steady hand of methodical progression marked the greater component of accomplishment than the technological rapidity of keyboard firing squads?  Or, of that other boast that one’s work has already been completed an hour into a workday, while others move in segments of slow motion, like a reel of film stuck in the ink spot of eternal delay?  What ever happened to the idea of a team effort, a communal approach, or even of a collective combine of aggregate accomplishments, where personal valor and individual recognition is sacrificed for the greater whole?

In modernity, in this millennial, during these self-aggrandized times, the focus of vulnerability is based upon an egocentric mirror of reflective selfishness.  As one has been taught throughout grammar school and higher education that the war hero is merely likened to a sports hero, where the term “courage” is another fungible word that can be applied as much to the battlefield as to a spectator sport of button-pushing, so the worth of an individual is relatively compared to a production quota, like mere means to the end of a drama.

In the administrative law of Federal Disability Retirement, that sense of worth is greatly diminished and deliberatively demeaned by the hostile attitude towards a Federal or Postal employee with a medical condition.  Don’t think that the years of productive accomplishments touted previously will mean a farthing’s worth of reserved good will; it means nothing.  What is done today and promised tomorrow are the two components of meaningful discourse; any delay or doubt evinced by one’s medical condition, is but a red-light indicator for termination or administrative sanctions.

For Federal and Postal employees who can no longer perform one or more of the essential elements of one’s positional duties, preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is indeed a means to an end – to escape the growing boast of that Supervisor or Manager who believes that the Federal or Postal employee who suffers from a medical condition is the same one who hinders by being an obstacle of existence for doing the work of 10 people, when in fact he or she is merely one of a greater collective effort, nor more than the worth of the dismissive “you”.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire