The first change that you’ll notice on the adjusted hierarchy of needs of the average South African citizen while Eskom sorts out its internal disputes is that self-actualisation has been removed as an achievable goal. The reason for this is quite simply that personal growth of any type is perhaps the last thing we need during Stage 6 rolling blackouts.

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is an idea in psychology proposed by American Abraham Maslow in 1943.

The rest of the adjustments are:

Replacing self-esteem, confidence and a respect for others are patience with ineptitude and tolerance of incompetence, together with brand-new needs to handwash clothes and light a fire with the end goal of boiling enough water for a single cup of coffee. (Should you fulfil these needs, consider yourself well on your way to reaching a state of Nirvana known as “living off the grid”, which, it must be said, in a modern world, there really is no need for.)

As for Maslow’s need to feel loved, this is replaced by the need to drive to a coffee shop with electricity and an internet connection to send and receive emails. To fulfil this need, you will require a tank full of petrol and enough mobile data to check which coffee shops in your province still have power.

Returning from the coffee shop, you will need to take a bath by candlelight and see the night out reading or watching movies you saved on external hard drive circa 2005.

The need for friendship, family and sexual intimacy make way for the need for longer-burning candles and a plus-size box of Lion safety matches. You might also need to revisit your plans for leaving the country and reacquaint yourself with what’s needed to emigrate successfully. You will need to check your rage and make peace with the fact that there is absolutely nothing you can do (other than emigrate).

In the parlance of Maslow himself, you must accept you are powerless in the situation. In current-day South Africa, that means in every possible way.

Finally, we’ve reached the anticlimax. At the very base of this tuneless triangle lies a singular need. What were known as the physiological needs – breathing, sex, water, sleep and food – are replaced by a need so elementary it hardly belongs on a hierarchy, less so on one thought up by a psychologist. It’s a need, you could say, that falls in the category of Not Too Much To Ask. It’s a minimum requirement to survive in an urban setting; a given if you want to call yourself a part of modern society. If not a birthright, to have this need fulfilled at no extra cost to the taxpayer is the constitutional right of anyone living in a functioning democracy.

Yes, the need is simply electricity and it doesn’t matter where it comes from. Whether from solar, hydro, wind, coal or nuclear – all we need, dearest Eskom, our sole and hopelessly dysfunctional energy provider, is the air that we breathe and a steady stream of power so that we can get on with our lives.

If not the luxury of an always-on power grid humming along, at least take us back to the glory days of Stage 4 load shedding when we knew, at the very most, we’d be hit by two outages a day. We will not even ask what on earth happened to elevating us to Stage 5 before hitting us with Stage 6.

We will cook our food and watch our shows in our allotted times. And if that’s pushing the limits of your turbines, at least keep the country at Stage 6 and don’t, for the love of God, tell us we’re on Stage 8. DM168

This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, which is available countrywide for R25.