Federal Medical Retirement Law: The Dogmatist

It is easy to fall into being one; and, one need not be overtly (or overly) religious in order to be considered as such.  Ultimately, it is not the opinion held or the inability to see different perspectives or “angles” on a matter; rather, it is the attitude which defines the dogmatist — the arrogance; the refusal to consider other viewpoints; the intransigence of thought.

Now, that is not to say that being “dogmatic” is always a negative thing; for, there are instances in life where “sticking to one’s principles” is a good and necessary thing.  Sometimes, when the winds of change and the malleability of ethical or moral convictions seem to reactively alter as quickly as the weather, it is of some comfort to find a dogmatist in our midst.  But context and content combined, always matter; and it is the “when” as much as the “what” which determines whether being a dogmatist is justified.

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 duties, being a dogmatist may be a detriment.  Never think that your own case is a “slam dunk”; for, to be unequivocally adamant about the strength of your disability case is often because the one who suffers from a disabling medical condition cannot think otherwise — in other words, like a dogmatist would think.

Consider, instead, contacting a Federal Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law in order to get a more balanced view of your case, and leave your dogmatic views on more pressing moral or ethical issues which may necessitate the strength of your convictions in order to retain the antiquity of intransigent thoughts.

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 Disability Retirement Application: The Facade

In its simplest definition, it is simply the frontal face of a building, expression or impression.  In its more insidious connotation, it is the mask which hides an ugliness within, and thus is meant to deceive.

Or, perhaps not even an ugliness, but of something secretive, of a necessity to cover, to conceal, to brush over in order that people will only notice the skin-deep impression left, the appearance upon first encounter, and not to notice the substance beneath or behind the facade.

Can a mask be kept on for long?  Will the concealment cover for long enough, or wide enough?  And long enough — for what?

Perhaps it is merely a smile to conceal grief; a smirk, to mask pain; or in reverse, of tears in order to contain disgust or anger.

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, having a “facade” is most natural, if not a necessity.  You want to seem “as if” — as if you are still able to do your job; as if nothing is wrong; as if….

At some point, however, the facade may not work, and you may have to prepare, formulate and file an effective Federal Disability Retirement application under FERS, through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

At that point, the facade which you wore so well may not be the mask you intended, for some may have come to believe that the facade was the actual you without the facade, in which case the facade may have been one facade too many.

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 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: Careful Planning

Is there any other type?  Do we ever plan, but do it carelessly?  Or, is it a redundancy to ascribe any planning as being “careful”?  Another question, of course, is the manner in which we determine the basis of such planning; i.e., is it only a retrospective judgment that is made after the fact?  In other words, do we ascribe the designated title of “careful planning” only after things have gone smoothly, and that of “careless planning” when things have not?

When the boss pats you on the shoulder and says, “Good job” and you turn and smugly respond, “Well, it’s just a matter of careful planning,” is such a response appropriate only because things had turned well?  And when it does not, do you just say: “Well, despite careful planning, there were some unforeseen circumstances that arose and all we can do is to counter them as best we can”?

There is, of course, such an animal as “careless planning” — where one has engaged in the motions of planning a future course of events, but has not taken the time to think it through, plan alternative avenues for “handling a potential conflict”, or otherwise did not meticulously prepare for the upsides and downsides of potential difficulties.  And that is the key, isn’t it — to consider the options, take into account the possibilities, and to plan accordingly?

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 position, careful planning in the preparation, formulation and submission of an effective Federal Disability Retirement application is a “must”.

We all engage in retrospective confirmation of our actions, and the single telling factor of careful planning in a Federal Disability Retirement application is when you receive an “approval” from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.  Of course, when dealing with a Federal bureaucracy, a denial does not necessarily mean that careful planning was not engaged in, but merely that further planning and careful consideration must be given in order to battle with, and prevail, against OPM.

Consult with an attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law and begin to formulate the plans which will be most effective in obtaining your disability retirement benefits from OPM.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement under FERS: A Thousand Cuts

It is the classic question which allegedly reveals something about a person’s inner psyche: Of whether you would rather die from a thousand cuts, or quickly and instantaneously?  Of course, the third option is never allowed within the hypothetical, because to include it would defeat the whole purpose of the question: Of continuing to live, or even of a “middle” ground, where it is not quite a thousand cuts and not nearly immediately.

But implicit in the “thousand cuts” alternative contains the hope of surviving, anyway, doesn’t it?  For, presumably to inflict a thousand slashes implies that it would take a considerable amount of time, as well as agony, torturous pain and unimaginable cruelty imposed; but it is time of which we seek in order to have any chance of survival, isn’t it?

Time is what we seek; that tomorrow may be different from today; that a future beyond the apparent corner may be a destiny yet unknown; that, without tomorrow, there would be no flame of hope, and it is that flame — however weak, flickering or susceptible to extinguishment at any moment — that we guard because the looming shadows await to overwhelm and dominate, like the lurking stranger behind the facade patiently awaiting to pounce once the flame dies.

We can endure much, and the time of agony can be withstood so long as there is some hope for tomorrow; and it is when tomorrow offers no hope that then we might ruefully mourn the choices we made in suffering through the thousand cuts.

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 job, the endurance suffered can be liked to the torturous spectacle of being cut a thousand times.  Perhaps Federal Disability Retirement is that very flame of hope that will keep you going.

Consult with a lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law and seek that goal of maintaining the flicker; for, without it, the tomorrow we live for may be extinguished by the other alternatives unimagined.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS Medical Retirement from the OPM: Loss of Perfection

Is the human species the only one on earth that holds within it a paradigm of perfection?

That is, of course, the argument used by Medieval Scholastics in arguing for the existence of an omniscient being — that, in order for an imperfect being to possess and have the very idea of perfection, there must by logical necessity exist an objective Being who manifests the characteristics of perfection.

This is a much-simplified version of the Scholastic Philosophers — one such example being St. Anselm’s Ontological Argument for the Existence of God, which begins with the rather confusing linguistic pretzel of: God is that than which nothing greater can be thought of….  Such linguistic complexity makes one pause and consider the conceptual conundrum of defining an X which is beyond the thought process within one’s capacity, but that is, indeed, the major premise in the syllogistic proposal.

The minor premise, of course, is the statement posited in an offhand, understated way: That “to exist” is greater than “not to exist” — and how many of us would deny such a self-evident proposal?

And the conclusion that would follow naturally is that, because existence is self-evidently better than not to exist, therefore that than which nothing greater can be thought of must by logical consequence “exist”. Beyond the simple positing of such a syllogism, however, is the problematic follow-up that has beset our society and modernity — of perfection’s damaging residue upon a society which demands nothing less than perfection.  Or, rather, in today’s universe, it is the appearance of perfection that matters, and the destructive effect of such bosh.

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, the loss of the appearance of perfection will mean that the Federal Agency or the Postal Service will begin to (if it hasn’t already) punish, harass and demean; for, one of the greatest sins since Eve’s misdeed and Adam’s deficiency is of being mortal, of showing vulnerability and revealing weakness; in other words, one’s appearance of perfection has been shattered.

That is when preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management becomes a necessity — for, the other syllogism for Federal employees and Postal workers suffering from a medical condition is thus: Imperfection is a reality of life; health conditions are an inevitability for most; Therefore, filing for Federal Disability Retirement is the next logical step.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Lawyer Representation for OPM Disability Retirement Claims under FERS and CSRS: Rebirth

The term and the conceptual attachment possesses a connotation that is often repugnant to atheists and pagans – although, if reincarnation and a circular vision of regeneration of life are the belief-systems embraced, the declaration of “rebirth” or being “reborn” are not that foreign.

It can, too, have a very elementary meaning, to encompass merely a “new beginning” or a sense of transcending or climbing into a different stratosphere of thinking; sort of like “thinking outside of the box”, or of entering a “different phase” of life.  That, too, is interesting, is it not – where we never think in terms of “descending”, but always of “ascending” – as if the former is always related to death, catacombs and unmarked graveyards with cemeteries full of weeds and overgrown ivy?

Rebirth is physiologically an impossibility, and thus do we ascribe to a cognitive or spiritual transference where change is often dramatic, originating from a trauma of experiences that must be left behind.  But the experience itself – of a rebirth – can come about in a mundane, systematic, thoughtful and often enlightened means by nothing more than mere cadence of monotony – retirement; having children; getting married; becoming old; moving to a different country or even across a state line; these, too, can constitute a rebirth.

Or, how about adopting a dog from a rescue kennel and giving it a “rebirth” of sorts – doesn’t it reverberate back to the rescuer as well?  What we find when we do that is this:  We believe we are doing the “favor” for the abused animal, when in fact it is often the very reverse, where the animal brings out from within us a capacity for caring, empathy and love that we would otherwise have never known, and that, too, is a form of rebirth.

Filing 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 – can that, too, be a form of rebirth?  It all depends upon the attitude of approaching such a “next step” – Is it to escape, or to refocus?  Is it an indicator of a reshuffling of priorities?  Will it allow for an easing of debilitating pain and allow for a journey to attain a plateau of rehabilitation, such that a second career or further vocation will be possible?

Surely, rebirth is a wide enough concept to encapsulate a pathway through the bureaucratic morass of getting a Federal Disability Retirement application approved, and why not?

After spending years trying to hide the medical condition and the symptoms that naturally go along with it, moving on to the next phase of life can be nothing more than a rebirth, of sorts.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
Federal Disability Attorney

  

Medical Retirement from Federal Employment: And then we die

(It is the parenthetical previous statement that ultimately matters, left blank to be completed, and never to be presumed).  Actions of finality, or seemingly so, tend to create an aura of despair and angst.  Once, in a world where purpose was never questioned, and the teleological end of man never brought forth the hint of doubt, the cohesiveness of society’s resolve was never a pause.  It is the modernity of hesitation, trepidation and loss of judgment that brings us to the pit of incessant questioning, as opposed to “doing”.  This is a maddening world, where the rise of Existentialism and post-modern impotence leaves us to seek therapy at every turn.

What we do in our lives before that terminal event; what dreams we once possessed before the souring of cynicism overwhelmed us; and of those lazy summer nights when the dancing illumination of fireflies dotted the canvas of a blackened void, when thoughts would drift beyond the mere mediocrities of present lives, current circumstances and seemingly unassailable realities which constrained, restricted and limited the dreams shattered by the reality of our travails; it was then that a glimmer of hope, an expectation of possibility, and a hint of potentiality yet unrealized, would creep into the essence of our souls.

Fairytales matter, because youth cannot survive another day without some fantasy of hope; and doors left unopened and locked with the resolve of “forever” will only diminish and destroy, where the need for tomorrow yet shouts in a rashness of desire.  To shut the pathway to dreams or to construct obstacles for the mere sake of obstruction is to strangle that parenthetical gleam of light yet unextinguished and to betray the angels who look down upon us with the remnants of wings to be unfurled, in hopes of fluttering to pass by with a smile.

Perhaps, one day, there will still be such follies to believe in.  For now, there is only the toil of daily grind, and thus are we left with the question implicit in the statement:  And then we die.

In Muriel Barbery’s work, The Elegance of the Hedgehog, a youthful life of advantage but of seeming meaninglessness is traded with an older woman’s upward trajectory once lost in the anonymity of class distinctions, and the theme throughout encompasses the essence of a life’s worth.  We all want to embrace meaning and value in the life which has been given; have we fulfilled our potential?  Did the dreams we once possessed, handed to us like jewels on a plate of limitless infinity, become realized, or was it a wasted phantasm like a handful of sand squeezed and escaping through the crevices of our closed fists?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are considering filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the questions garnered by thoughts of future insecurity are natural and plentiful.  It is, in many ways, similar to the refrain repeated herein:  And then we die.

Once a Federal Disability Retirement application is approved, and the Federal or Postal employee is separated from the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service, one wonders:  Was my work of any lasting value?  Did I leave an imprint upon the shifting sands of a prior existence?  Did I make a difference?

But those questions should be cast aside and left behind, and instead, it is still the future of one’s unfinished work that should always be focused upon, and preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is to continue the narrative in working upon that familiar refrain, that the future still promises a fulfillment of unfinished potentiality, and the unmarked grave need not be one which is unvisited even in the twilight of our lives.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The Venting Venue

It is a necessary doorway (or so we are told) in order to attain sound psychological health; that, within the raging furnace of subsumed consciousness, of passions suppressed and grievances left unstated but yet seething beneath the subterranean caverns of unspecified aggregations of cumulative powder kegs confined by bloated egos, there remains a need for the fissure to emit the toxicities of life.  Or not.

The content of such emissions, of course, can never be challenged; it is only the context which should be questioned, in this age where subjectivity rules, the personal pronoun delegates, and the sacrosanct opinion of the “I” overcomes any Aristotelian residue of logical argumentation.  Venting is healthy (or so they say), and therapeutic, to boot.  And that which is both therapeutic and good, must by self-definition be unquestioned by any moral compass of historical certitude basked in tradition.

Thus, diatribes against parents are open game; vitriol against mothers, step-mothers, and especially mother in-laws are quite fashionable, and validated if spiced with an acerbic wit which only the unwitting can discern; and, certainly, the general population of parents, bad parents or parents who dared to restrict, set limits or otherwise constrained the alleged creativity of choice, lifestyle optioning and declarative innuendos of rejecting tradition and historicity of values, must be publicly flogged until the defamation of insensitivity is squeezed out of each, and where only the silence of conformity prevails, so that all traditions are banished into the timeless trashheaps of lost civilizations.

Perhaps it is good to vent; but when the “how”, the “where”, and the content-consciousness of “what” is left unconstrained, the issue is no longer whether, but if wisdom should properly channel it.  A stream flowing in front of a house, quietly lapping over the gentle smoothness of moss-covered rocks, may paint the picture of a serenity wrapped in the quietude of a morning mist; but when such waters turn into a raging turbulance and rise to levels which engulfs the rural solitude of a farmer’s self-sufficiency, the stream is then no longer the lifeline of gaiety and childhood warmth of memories unsheathed, but a warning that even the dreams of a butterfly can turn like a viper with fangs previously unseen.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who need 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 proper preparation of an effective OPM Disability Retirement application should never be used as the venting venue for one’s solace or therapeutic health.  That should be left for another day, a different doorway, and a separate pathway for healthy living.

It is, indeed, the things stated in that moment of anger, actions embraced in a fit of rage, or hurts flung as self-defeating propositions, which one comes to regret.  The Federal Disability Retirement application, by contrast, must be objective, thoughtful, forceful in its argumentation and legal methodology of analysis and evaluative content, and never to be deemed impotent as a result of a venting venue of unnecessary contextual lapses.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement Systems: The mindful gargoyle

In architecture, they serve a pragmatic purpose of duality:  they divert unwanted seepage of water by redirecting it away from the side of a structure, but moreover, they serve the equally important spiritual task of keeping evil spirits at bay.

In everyday life, the concept can take on multiple meanings; of a grotesque figure unattractive on the outside, but encompassing an unseen beauty within through his or her thoughts, concerns and conceptual constructs; or of the monster which stays hidden within a tortured soul, where the fantasy of our own imaginations loom larger than the realities we may face; or, further, denoting phantasm from Medieval days where knights and dragons slayed have returned in more subtle forms of windmills left churning in the fields of fear of our own making.

All of them are barely noticed, now; onlookers pass by the structures which jut with such figures of antiquity; of monsters and grotesque figurines, we barely notice in this technological universe of pragmatism where fantasies of spiritual fears are dismissed as mere shams abbreviated from the shamans of yore; and of those looming monsters which haunt us in the nightmares of sleepless hours?

Pharmacology and the innane science of hope have become the masters of our fate, as Darwinian determinism has replaced the Oracles of ponderous paths.  There are no more mindful gargoyles; only materialism and the tactile reality of a virtual universe we have created in repose of empty caverns, where vacuity of thought is mistaken for profound moments of cognitive clarity, when in truth it is the dissonance of our own creation which leaves us trembling in the corners of our own fears, paralyzed with haunting thoughts and haunted imaginings.

But that we could return to the days of Tom and Huck, and win the heart of Becky Thatcher in braided pigtails of forgotten innocence; but, then, we would have to give up all of those “advances” we are lectured about by insistent voices booming in megaphones of self-interested diatribes.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers, of course, the mindful gargoyle is of utmost importance.  For, it is that symbol and pablum of life that interjects and disrupts; the fears which prevent us from progress are precisely those which loom larger in the creativity of our own minds, where such phantoms preventing steps taken to move forward are the ones which need to be slain in mind first, then in the world outside.

That is why, often, the first step in the long bureaucratic process of preparing, formulating and filing 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, is to speak with an Attorney, in order to “objectively” assess one’s chances and develop pragmatic steps towards a potentially successful outcome.

For, in the end, preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits should reflect a pragmatic purpose — somewhat like the architectural utility of the gargoyles seen on structures of Medieval contortions, and not left in the dusty attics of fearful minds and monsters unslain in the deep recesses of cringing thoughts.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire