Federal Disability Retirement: Different Approaches

There is a difference between the ‘How’ and ‘Why’ of things — “How something is done” is quite different from “Why something is done.”

One can argue that the ‘Why’ of something should logically precede the ‘How’, for the meaningfulness attached will motivate as to the mechanical doing of it; whereas, others will propose that one should simply follow Nike’s oft-repeated logo — “Just do it” — and in the act of doing it, the meaningfulness of the activity will naturally follow and be discovered.

Ultimately, they represent different approaches, and may even be characterized by different personalities.  The one who simply charges forward without purpose or meaning may be superficially identified as a ‘pragmatist’ of sorts, while the one who first ponders the “Why” of everything may require a ‘spiritual’ source in everything before proceeding.

In the end, however, the underlying source of everything returns us to that what Viktor Frankl identified as the central human motivational force — the paradoxical search for a life’s meaning.  The importance of the ‘Why’ cannot be ignored; and as science can only point to the ‘How’ of anything, the emptiness of an unanswered ‘Why’ will often paralyze us.

Life is difficult as it is, with calamities and unexpected twists and turns along the way, and the fragile state of our health can be devastating without having an answer as to the ‘Why’ of everything.

For FERS Federal employees and U.S. Postal Service workers who suffer from an chronic injury or other condition and are forced to make a major decision moving forward, preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application under FERS with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management may be one of the biggest fights of your life, and while a FERS medical attorney may not be able to answer the more important question as to the ‘Why’ of what has occurred, it is the more pragmatic ‘How’ which may be needed, for the time being.

Sometimes, the different approaches require a priority of answers in a sequence less than optimally answered, and in the case of filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under the FERS system with OPM, it is the question of ‘How’ which must take precedence.

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 Medical Retirement: The Proper Perspective

You can gather all of the available facts, and yet still make the wrong decision because you fail to have the proper perspective.  To have the right perspective, you must assess and evaluate the facts as presented and arrive at the best judgment based upon a proper perspective.  The “proper perspective”, moreover, is often based upon a lifetime of habits formed in how one engages the facts amassed.

Do you allow for emotional prejudices to cloud your judgment, or have you cultivated a habit of dispassionate review?  Are you able to set aside the overwhelming sense of panic which can lead to a reactionary course of response, or can you set the issue aside and come back to it with a reserved approach of greater objectivity?

In most cases encompassing a variety of facts, a requirement of interpretive analysis must occur, and that process of arriving at the best course of action in determining the comparative and superlative degrees of a judgment does not necessarily mean that there is a singular “best” course, for reasonable people may differ on that.

And, of course, that is the proverbial “rub” of the issue — that the proper perspective arrived at the time may not lead to the best action to be taken, but merely that, given a set of facts analyzed at a given time and place, it is the “proper” one for the moment.  Other facts and circumstances may come into play if left to ponder, but because an imminent decision must be made, it is often enough to rely upon one’s best judgment in moving forward.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a chronic illness or injury such that an application for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under the FERS system must be considered, arriving at the proper perspective will often be clouded by the medical condition itself.  As such, it is important to have the assistance of a lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law in order to provide the proper perspective in fighting against OPM for your rights.

The perspective of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is always that no Federal or Postal employee qualifies for Federal Disability Retirement, and will often deny a case by making it appear that you had no chance for success, to begin with.  However, that approach is not the right or proper perspective, and the way to counter OPM and arrive at the proper perspective is to apply the law.

Contact a Federal Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and respond with the proper perspective.

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 Help: The Unraveling

It is similar, yet quite distinct, from the concept of “unwrapping”, or even of “finding”, “revealing”, of “unearthing”.  For, the other words describe an indication of voluntariness — of a third-party agent (or even of the first-person pronoun) engaging in an act of deliberative steps toward an appearance of something.

But that other term — the word which is today’s focus — has a frightening aspect of loss of control, inability to contain, a lack of freedom or choice, and even implying a frailty of crumbling, catastrophic consequences.  When there is a societal unraveling — or even a personal one — there is an underlying sense that the constraints, borders, fences and outer membranes which once restrained and held together the entity contemplated, are now disintegrating.

The term, “bursting at the seams” or “cracks in the foundation” and similar metaphors, are all appropriate when using the term, “unraveling”.

Sometimes, it seems that society as a whole is unraveling.  But societies don’t unravel unless there is an aggregation of personal unravelings, where the cumulative effects of many such individual unravelings result in the further metaphor of “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts” phenomenon, in a negative, reversing manner.

Unraveling, of course, is what sells newspapers and online stories; the trading of bad news is always scintillating for the prurient needs we all ascribe to; and the antidote to such a sense of unraveling is to take a walk through your own neighborhood, where it is likely that things still likely appear “normal” and “together”.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are experiencing a personal sense of unraveling because of a chronic medical condition which impacts one’s ability and capacity to perform the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal Service job, the solution may be to file for FERS Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

Preparing an effective Federal OPM Disability Retirement application under the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) is tantamount to taking that “walk” through one’s own neighborhood, to get away from the greater sense of unraveling.  For, whether society as a whole is unraveling, or you next door neighbor’s life appears to be boring and normal, you may want to contact a FERS attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and begin the process of preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal or Postal Disability Retirement Application.

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 Benefits: Purpose and Meaning

They can feed off of each other in motivating us, and have cross-boundaries in their definitional relevance.  “Meaning” provides the foundation for the signification of one’s activity or engagement; “Purpose” gives us the reason — or the meaning — of that which we do.

Before the development of the cognitive universe, we were compelled and motivated by instinct — of the basic reactionary need to survive without thought, purpose or meaning.  Or, perhaps one might argue, survival itself contained the meaning and purpose for every existence.

Once the cognitive universe began to develop — you know, that area of internal living comprised of our thoughts, words, conceptual universe, and the strings of sentences which form the universe of our daydreams, plans, anxieties and schemes — we required more and more of that duality of motivators: Purpose and Meaning.

For a good part of our society, work provided meaning and purpose; families solidified it; relationships obligated it.  When the seams of society begin to unravel, however, the duality of our motivations follow in successive disintegration, as well, and purpose and meaning become hollow echoes of sounds reverberating from a pebble dropped into a deep and uncaring cavern.

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 being able to perform one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, purpose and meaning may become undermined precisely because of the deteriorating circumstances triggered by the medical condition itself.

Contact a disability attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law and begin the process of recovering that purpose and meaning — that duality of motivators — by first securing your future with a Federal Disability Retirement annuity, then figuring out what will motivate you to move forward in life, into the next sector of this barren universe where one must find purpose and meaning outside of the postmodern era.

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: The Fight

Perhaps it is the remembrances of the Ali-Frazier era, or of one’s own childhood where we suddenly broke out into a melee of rash encounters; or maybe one is timid and never provokes, avoids all hostilities, diverts from any potential conflicts; whatever the background, there are fights that we remember, whether as a spectator or as a participant.

Was it the last shouting match with one’s spouse, where bitterness spewed and names were called when, once the butterfly of a stinging shadow left the lips that had been sealed with a promise, a shrug for regret overshadowed?  Was the provocation mere tiredness and stress such that upon the pent-up release of attacking the very one you love, you already felt better and thought, “Now, what was that all about?”

“The Fight” is the unreleased energy within, always ready to explode upon the provocation of a volcanic eruption needing the outlet waiting for an opening.  It is when we no longer have “the fight” within us that souls wither, personalities begin to diminish, and the flattened effect of a once-lively self begins to devour itself.  There is “the fight” within each of us, but life, circumstances, and especially medical conditions can begin to dampen, diminish, then destroy that spark of the rebel.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition begins to destroy “the fight” within us, it is time to recognize that staying with the Federal Agency or the particular Postal Facility is an unhealthy situation on top of the medical condition already suffered.

Preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is not an avoidance of a fight, nor an admission of defeat; rather, it is the last and true fight to win.

It is “The Fight” in order to preserve and protect one’s future, and not to simply walk about from all of that invested energy previously placed so prominently into one’s Federal or Postal career.  And remember that it is always prudent to hire a ringside trainer — an attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law — in order to get that “knockout” win by getting your Federal Disability Retirement approved.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Lawyer Representation for OPM Disability Retirement: Trapped

Desperation is born of it; escape routes relieve the sense of it; and in the end, it is a belief in the hope that there are alternatives which provides a release from it.  The wild animal that is trapped will do everything to escape, including acts of self-harm if there is no alternative presented.  Whether of higher intelligence or some lesser level, the sense or “feeling” of being trapped leads to a suffocating belief of hopelessness.

Armies allow for it; battles often depend upon it; and the “it” which demands for an unconditional surrender is countermanded if there has been a history of genocidal atrocities committed.  It is the hope for some alternative to the present circumstances of despondency that results in a relief from the sense of being trapped; but options and alternatives often remain obscured by fear, lack of knowledge and the paralyzed state itself of “feeling” trapped.

For humans, it is knowledge which is the greater release from such a state of restrictiveness, and for Federal and Postal employees specifically, who suffer from a medical condition where the medical condition is impacting more than their careers — from growing harassment to an imposition of a “Performance Improvement Plan” to further actions, including a proposed removal, etc. — including the tumultuous upheavals experienced in their personal lives, the sense of feeling trapped is a natural consequence of failing to act.

Animals are known to act in desperation and reactionary ways; humans, it is wrongly thought, engage in a more reflective mode of acting — i.e., in a more deliberative, considered approach.  But the sense of feeling trapped often undermines the rational side of humans, and it is in such a state of desperation that the Federal or Postal employee will submit a poorly-prepared Federal Disability Retirement application, increasing the chances of a First-Stage denial.

Filing a Federal Disability Retirement application with the assistance of an attorney will not necessarily guarantee success at any given stage of the process, but it may raise the chances of such success at each and every stage.  In the end, it is knowledge of the options available which allows for the release of one from “feeling trapped”, and consultation with an experienced attorney when preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is the best way to release the hope for a more secure future in entering into the traps of OPM.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Lawyer Representation for OPM Disability Claims: The Cynic’s Corner

The Cynic’s Corner is that part of the mindset that has encountered the worst of human behavior; where sunshine is merely a prelude to a dark cloud; when brightness is predicted to last for only a short while; and where — when a declaration is made with a joyful sound of delightful exclamations like, “It’s the weekend!” — is immediately followed by the undermining postscript, “Yes, and then Monday follows.”

The view that life’s brutish perspective can be seen in stark contrast with the idealist’s naïveté that everything has a bright side to it, that human depravity always wins out by love, and sunshine always follows a cloud burst or a week of rainy Sundays.  Is moderation always the answer to the charge that truth never fits upon the spectrum of excessiveness, and it is the extremes of perspectives that defy the logic of truth?

The Cynic’s Corner is attained and reserved by and for the aged; for it is only by experience of life’s encounters with daily human depravity that one can come to the conclusion that the Cynic’s Corner has reached.  The fresh smile of youth’s hope; the innocent eyes for the swan in flight or the fawn in the hunter’s headlights; these will dissipate like time, wrinkle-less laughter and the fresh bones of a healthy body; and then the cynic whispers, “But in the end, we all wither and die.”

Perhaps.  Or, more to the point, Yes, there is certainly an end to everything, but isn’t the point not of how it ends, but of the manner it is lived?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition where the medical condition itself has reached a critical point of “no return”, it is important to prepare an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, whether you are under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, and submit it in a timely manner with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

If you are already a member of the Cynic’s Corner, then you will have already concluded that everything that could go wrong in the preparation, formulation and submission of the Federal Disability Retirement application, can and often does go wrong, and that is why consulting with a FERS Disability Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement law is an essential feature and component of the entire administrative process, lest you have renounced your seat at the Cynic’s Corner and have instead joined that “other” club — the Knights of Naïveté.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal and Postal Disability Retirement Benefits: Signs

It is the title of a song by a group called, “Five Man Electrical Band”, first released in 1970, then re-released in 1971, and the lyrics intelligently portray a world replete with warnings, admonitions, commands and curtailing threats, demanding of us a conduct of conformity otherwise ignored unless backed by such direct mandates.

Of course, there are the other, more subtle signs that we either ignore or otherwise dismiss because of the quiet manner of reproach initiated.  Those subtle signs as evidenced by facial expressions; of a look unexplainable but surely existent with consequential meaning; or premonitions of rougher surf and winds blowing, animals fleeing to the relative safe havens guided by instinctive alarm; and of the rush of adrenaline raising the tiny prickles upon out neck and backs, in dark corners of unlit areas when sounds so distant precede the visual image of oncoming danger.

Do we pick up on them, or go through life disregarding unless and until the reverberations of such deliberate ignorance shatters the calm and quietude of our joyful resolve to remain blind behind a security of negation?  Those trite statements of permeable permissibility:  “He was a nice, quiet man,” said the neighbor next door after the devastation left by the referent cause; “I never saw it coming,” hoarsely uttered by the hospitalized individual in the midst of destruction and debris-filled lands; “Who would have thought…”  And, indeed, in this universe where thinking is paramount, and observation of subtleties a requirement for survival, it is that which we ignore that can harm and injure.

There are those in life who float through and must be protected by means of oversight and constant care; some drivers on the road (or, perhaps, most of them) have no business carrying a license; it is only because others avoid and careen away that survival without a dent, a bruise or a catastrophic collision carries forth an undisturbed pathway from point A to the destination of choice.  And so we have new signs to consider:  It is now unlawful to text or otherwise use a Smartphone in hand, while others who drive with one hand stuffing a cheeseburger in one’s mouth while drinking a coke with the other, and with that invisible third hand pushing buttons on the panel to change satellite stations – somehow, that is safer because the signs tell us so, or at least implicitly inform as to the priority of current concerns.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are surrounded by signs – both subtle and direct – that it is time to move on, ignoring them will not make the underlying, substantive problems dissipate.  Having a medical condition is the first sign, but one which may have no significant impact; but when that medical condition begins to prevent the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of the Federal or Postal employee’s positional duties, then such an indicia of life’s intersecting whisper should, at a minimum, be elevated to a “warning”.

And when the signs flashing from the Agency’s perspective – of warnings, threats, harassing actions and administrative sanctions – begin to blare loudly as more than just a passing blur of the speed limit which we all tend to ignore, but instead becomes planted prominently for you and all to see, then it is time to prepare, formulate and file an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, so that the signs indicated don’t result in those flashing lights in the review mirror forcing us to stop and be hauled before a magistrate to explain those actions of ignoring such signs which we knew, or should have known, needed to be followed.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The script of life

Seeking out the pathways of precognition by consulting with the ancient oracles, was merely that same attempt.  Prediction and foreknowledge were the precursors of script writing; as the former failed to provide an advantageous statistical weighting, so the shift to a more pragmatic approach reflects the recognition that the gods provided no greater insight than mere chance, and so we’d better get on with life and attempt to control fate, destiny and the travesties of life’s lottery by writing the narrative ourselves.

Thus do economic systems of varying control mechanisms arise, where socialism and fascism, state-run artifices constructed to ensure prevention of extremes, thereby comforting us from the worst nightmares and fears born of childhood insecurities.

Virtual reality is safer than real reality; staring into a smartphone and chasing figments of imaginative characters and ghosts that exude cuteness in violent but funny ways, are all preferable to facing the harshness of daily living.  We may not know when we will capture the prize, but the script has been written so that it becomes settled law as to whether.  Reality shows may sometimes surprise, but the unexpected itself is easily anticipated; that is part of the deal, and there is not much art in it after all.

Shakespeare’s quote comes from his play, As You Like It, Act II, Scene VII:  “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players; they have their exits and entrances, and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages.”

Such was the surrender to fate, now replaced by inane self-help books which purportedly boosts one’s self-confidence, makes one look like a Reality T.V. personality, and allegedly creates wealthy patrons of us all.  All throughout, we seek merely to obtain a copy of the script of life so that we can practice our parts, and not have to think about what must be done.  We seek predictability when the world offers chance; beg for mercy, when all there appears is savagery; and fall prey to the oracles of modernity, when even the ancients failed to deliver.

In the sphere of Federal and Postal employees, of course, it is the medical condition itself which was never asked to be included in that script of life.  It is one of those “curve-balls” which happens to the other guy, and never to us; or so we always played our part to live by.  But when it occurs, and life presents the unpredictable in a chaotic universe of harsh reality, we are asked to simply “deal with it”, and so we must.

For the Federal or Postal employee whose medical condition begins to impact and prevent the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Postal or Federal positional duties, the script which must be ad-libbed is the part where decisions concerning the future must be engaged.  Should I file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits?  When should the process be started?  Is it ever too late?  Is the Federal Disability Retirement application filed with my agency, or with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management?  Should I consult with an attorney?

These questions, and many more, even the ancient oracles would not have been able to answer.  The undeniable fact is, that the script of life rarely is written to reflect the reality of life’s harshness; it simply “is”, and must be acted upon according to what is given, even when consulting with the high priest or priestess of the ancient oracles provides only silence and an impervious unresponsiveness.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: Paradigms abandoned

Of course, the most significant discussion concerning the shifting of major paradigms in the intellectual sphere of human advancement, occurs in Thomas Kuhn’s work, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.  The concept of a “paradigm” shift, of adhering to a hypothetical model despite evidentiary incommensurability with the reality of an impervious and objective world; of a theocratic insistence upon a geocentric explanation despite factual calculations pertaining to a heliocentric reality; of bloodletting in medicine based upon the foundational paradigm of the bodily balance of humors; and, in personal lives, of how things “ought to be” as opposed to what actually are.

The farther an issue is removed from a direct impact upon one’s life, the easier it is to discuss it and arrive at conclusions based upon a rational discourse of commensurability.  Life lived as art is far more convenient than when the dreariness of engaging in the proverbial “reality check” must be faced in the mirror of one’s life.  Rarely does one apply a “scientific” approach when evaluating and assessing the reflection in a mirror; that is always left to the laboratory phase of one’s bifurcated life of compartmentalized delusions.  Yet, paradigms are precisely how we live; we just may not call it that, nor the foundation of our own actions in that manner.

Do we proceed based upon the expectations of others?  That, then, is a paradigm of objectified influences upon our motivational structure.  Are decisions primarily based upon an instinctive reservoir of emotional turmoil?  Consider, then, the paradigm of that lesser construct of our soul as identified by Plato in delineating the greater whole by comparative analysis between the state of one’s inner workings and that of the state itself.  In the end, the most telling factor in determining the essence of any human being, is not necessarily by the paradigms by which one adheres, but in the very ones which have been abandoned.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suddenly find that a medical condition will likely cut short a promising and lengthy career, the abandonment of a paradigm must by necessity become an integral part of the process.  For, the attachment to the conventional perspective cannot be underestimated; the belief that career should override all other concerns, including one’s own health; that future retirement is to be dictated by an imagined age of demarcation where competence and inertia rules by physical necessity; or, that the “mission of the agency” is the priority at all costs, including one’s own health and well-being.

Whatever the paradigm upon which the basis of motivational irrationality subsists, the facing of reality will clash when the progressive deterioration resulting from an unexpected and chronic medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal employee from continuing any longer.

Filing a Federal Disability Retirement application with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, becomes an inevitability when the proportionality between reality and the conceptual construct of a paradigm insisted upon becomes incommensurate; but, then, Kuhn had already warned us of that eventuality, as well as the fact that a paradigm abandoned is tantamount to a revolution conceived; we just kept believing that the tectonic shift was meant for the “other guy“, and never for ourselves.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire