UP NEPA: The Pavlovian response to mediocrity

Pavlovian’s theory involves pairing a stimulus with a conditioned response. In his experiment, he used a bell as a stimulus to condition a response with his dogs. He discovered that events and objects can trigger a conditioned response. I made the connection with the programming and social conditioning, recently on one of my trips to Nigeria.

I had come in for a well deserved break and one of the many shocking reminders that greeted me upon my return were the chants of UP NEPA, Praise the Lord and a number of varied and modified cries of relief to the restoration of light. I look out of the window and hear shouts of the children in the street as they rejoiced and danced for joy that the electricity had been restored. I shake my head in despair, yes indeed, I was home. I was numb.

I was in for a greater shock as I visited my sister over the weekend and her 4-year-old son abruptly jumped off the couch shouting UP NEPA and ran off to power the desk top computer to play some educational games. I was saddened. He must have picked it from his mother and she must have picked up also from the family and the cycle continues. Wait, haven’t they changed their name? It was not just about changing the name, the whole structure needs to have change.

Years of conditioning to rejoice at the banality of restored electricity had been undone by living abroad or so I thought. I have seen first hand the immense possibilities and rise in productivity that exist, the peace and quiet that pervades the atmosphere sans the raucous noise of the generators and incessant power interruptions.

What is there to rejoice about? Why aren’t we up in arms? Are we unable to see how dysfunctional and unproductive this has made us? I know people create their little oasis of artificially powered and alternative sources of energy but that is a stop gap measure. You can’t run the machinery all day, the noise for one is unnerving and you need to top up the diesel or give the generator a rest. So, no one is immune as long as this situation continues.

The incompetence of the Nigerian government has unconsciously conditioned us to rejoice and celebrate mediocrity. What is there to celebrate that light was restored after three days? Why should it be “taken” in the first place? Can we begin to calculate the amount of unproductivity that occurs for every hour one loses to darkness?

Imagine a situation where for a whole year, there is no report of power failure or outage and business owners are able to invest the money spent on petrol or diesel on human resource?

Imagine universities with all year round electricity in classrooms, lecture halls, libraries and free wifi? Can you fathom the amount of progress we would make as a nation?

The unconscious conditioning shows up when you search for a plug to charge a phone on 60% perchance there is no light when you get home.

This is my sixth day without light, I am tired of powering on the generator. My stream of consciousness had been disrupted so many times that I can’t seem to thread my thoughts effectively to produce the report that beckons. I have dissipated energy fending mosquitoes off, battling the heat and trying to drown the noise of the generators.

Alas, the light flickers on. I am numb, I feel nothing, no relief, no joy, no Up NEPA or whatever they are called these days. I just lay there thinking of how things can be better. I sigh and connect my laptop to the socket and sit down to get some work done. I can’t. My mind is all over the place. There has to be a way. We function in an environment that is designed to frustrate creativity and productivity and we have found a way to thrive even in the mire.

We pride ourselves on our resilience and ability to survive. We see it as a blessing but it is also our bane. Until, we say no to the conditioning that has held us back and we stop responding and start reacting. Our children would keep shouting UP NEPA and rejoicing and celebrating mediocrity.

I remember waking up with a fright one night in the UK because I hadn’t ironed for work the next morning and wondered what if there’d be no light?! I smiled as I remembered my postcode had changed and as surely as the sun would rise the next morning, there would be light unless an EMP was detonated or some horrible event occurred, there would be light. I smiled with satisfaction as I snuggled deeper into the sheets and pulled the duvet over my head.

I am going to unlearn that conditioning to celebrating nonsense. You should too.