Frequently Asked Questions

What is The Spin-Off Project?

The Spin-Off Project is a lifestyle experiment that is designed to help us develop our skills and discover our talents and passions. It’s the ultimate bucket list that allows us to live 12 different lifestyles in 1 year.

Why should I do a Spin-Off Project?

  • Discover your talents and develop your skills
    Putting yourself in different situations will allow you to discover a depth of talent and creativity.

  • Follow your joy and live a life without regrets
    This is your chance to experience 12 of your possible lives. Your chance to follow your joy, to answer all your what-if questions and to stop wasting your precious life.

  • Become the best version of yourself
    The act of learning and overcoming challenges leads to immense personal growth–intellectually and emotionally.

  • Find inner peace and true happiness
    Following your joy, getting to know your real self, allowing yourself to be who you are, and noticing what makes you happy and inspires you is what leads to inner peace and true happiness.

  • Be an inspiration and make the world a better place
    When you take responsibility for your life and when you find that peace within, you become stronger and happier. And by being the best version of yourself, you’re already changing the world for the better. But it doesn’t stop here.

    True happiness is contagious. You’ll soon find yourself to be an inspiration for everyone around you. You’ll inspire other people to also find their inner peace and true happiness. And when they do, they’ll do the same for others. Imagine.

Who is the Spin-Off Project for?

The Spin-Off Project is for people who ..

.. are yet to discover their passions and talents in life
Experimenting with 12 different lifestyles and putting yourself in different situations all the time, will help you find out what you’re good at and what it is that you’re most passionate about.

..feel like they don’t have time to learn something new or to do the things they love doing most
Trying to fit all of your interests and commitments into one week can make you feel rushed and unsatisfied. You end up doing things half-heartedly or not at all.

The Spin-Off Project helps you to organize your daily life in a stress-free manner.

You’ll be immersing yourself in doing only one thing at a time for a month, and therefore, your agenda will be a lot easier to follow and your mind clearer.

…just graduated from high school or college
When you just finish high school or college, it’s hard to decide what you want to do for the rest of your life.

The Spin-Off Project gives you the chance to explore your creativity and personal talents beyond traditional school subjects.

Taking a gap year to understand who you are, to discover what you like and what you’re good at is of great value for your future and happiness.

..would like to organize their sabbatical in a creative and useful way
Taking a sabbatical is a way to explore life beyond work without losing the financial security that a job provides. Doing a Spin-Off Project within a sabbatical allows you to make the best of your time off.

You’ll be able to travel, learn plenty of new things and engage in new adventures and possibilities that have felt out of reach for most of your life.

The Spin-Off Project is a life-changing experience and that’s exactly what you want to get out of a sabbatical.

..are traveling
The Spin-Off Project combines great with traveling.

You can make be a traveler one of the 12 lifestyles on your Spin-Off List and only go traveling for a month.

You can also use your (short-trip) travel destinations for a more complete travel experience.

Take cooking lessons during your travels in Thailand. Or, spend some weeks learning Capoeira in Brazil. Staying in incredible India? Lock yourself up for a month of soul-searching.

How does it work?

  1. Make a list of 12 lifestyles you’d like to explore Fill in the blanks: What would my life look like if I was a …….. ? Would I be good at ……..? I always wanted to be a ……..
  2. Take 1 year off from your work or studies and other commitments
  3. Devote this year to doing 1 of your 12 lifestyles each month

I can’t take a year off. Can I still do a Spin-Off Project?

Yes.

However, doing a Spin-Off Project while working full-time takes a lot more time and self-discipline.

Even if you can make yourself concentrate on the project after work, you’ll still have significantly less time (perhaps 2h instead of 8h) per day for doing your spin-offs. Difficult yes, impossible no.

You can make up for “the lost 6h per day” by allowing for 4 months per spin-off instead of one. Experiencing 3 different lifestyles in 1 year is still way awesome. 12 lifestyles in 4 years? Go for it! It’s about 12 more than most people get to experience in a lifetime.

Also, think of using your weekends and holidays. It’s when you have 8h-days to concentrate on your spin-offs. And, if your finances allow it, ask for 1, 3 or 6 months off. Or, consider working half a day or 1 or 2 days less per week.

Believe me, a year from now you’ll wish that you had started today. The finish line is not the goal, discovering your talents, developing your skills and finding your passions are.

Sidenote: If you’re in school or college, the same answer applies. Chances are that you have more time than somebody who has a full-time job, so it will be easier to make time for the project. And, if you’re about to finish high school, this would be the perfect moment–before heading to college–to take a gap year and do a Spin-Off Project.

How much does it cost to do a Spin-Off Project?

It depends.

Can your spin-offs be self-taught with free material from the internet? Or do you need expensive one-on-one courses? Can you take courses abroad (depending on where you live often cheaper) or do you need to take them in your home country? Do you need expensive gear or just your mind?

For example, learning a new language is cheap. It can be self-taught, the learning material (and even conversation partners) can be found on the internet for free, and you don’t need to leave your home country (which in this case is cheaper).

However, learning to kiteboard is expensive. The courses aren’t cheap nor is the gear, and there’s also a chance that you can’t learn to kiteboard in your home country, so you’ll need to buy a plane ticket too.

How much money you’ll need to finance a Spin-Off Project greatly depends on the 12 lifestyles that you wish to experience.

How do I finance a Spin-Off Project?

  1. With savings

  2. With your salary

    If you don’t have savings, consider doing a Spin-Off Project alongside your daily job.

  3. Go live abroad for a year

    Rent out your house (I have used AirBnb) and go live somewhere cheap (but comfortable) for a year, like South-East Asia. The money you’ll get from renting out your house could very well cover your plane ticket, stay and complete Spin-Off Project.

    Taking classes and courses abroad can be significantly cheaper too. Learning to kiteboard in Brazil is way less expensive than learning to kiteboard in Holland. So is taking salsa classes in Havana, or learning to surf in Bali. And what do you know, now you’re a traveler too.

    If you’d like more information about living cheap abroad, book a Skype talk with me on Plansify. I can share lots of information on the cost and standard of living in Sarajevo, Havana, Playa del Carmen, Bali, India and Brazil.

  4. Think: Same same but cheaper

    Let’s say you live in Holland and want to do one month of snowboarding. Unfortunately, however, you don’t have the money to go on a winter holiday.

    This is when you should think: same same but cheaper, and get yourself a subscription to an indoor slope in Holland instead. It costs about one kidney less and you’ll still experience what it means to be snowboarding for a month.

    Or, perhaps you want to learn how to make Thai food. No need to go to an expensive cooking school. Think: same same but cheaper, and browse the internet for recipes, hop onto YouTube for instructions and start learning and cooking.

    You can also ask the cook of your favorite Thai restaurant if you can tag along for a week or so. Or, you can hang up advertisements in the supermarket. Sure someone is willing to share their coco-curry secrets with you.

    If you’re struggling to apply the same same but cheaper idea, leave a comment on The Spin-Off Project’s Facebook wall. We’ll brainstorm together.

What camera do you use?

Since the summer of 2014, I’ve been using the Sony Cybershot DSC-RX100M II. Some of my favorite things about it are:

  • The full and semi-automatic modes make for stunning shots. I rarely need to shoot in manual mode (but can if I want to).
  • Food pictures turn out great even when there’s not much light to work with. This is usually the case in restaurants. Have a look at my Instagram account to see what I mean. Most of the newer food pictures are taken with this camera.
  • I can take pictures in square format. This saves me a lot of time and hassle when taking pictures for Instagram. I don’t need to worry about the composition or about having to crop the pictures afterward.
  • I love the Wi-Fi feature which allows me to transfer pictures from the camera to my laptop, iPad or phone for further editing and social media sharing.
  • As for the big red cherry on top: the compact size. I can take it everywhere I want with total ease. Beats a big ol’ DSLR every time.

This page doesn’t answer my question. How do I contact you?

Use the contact form and I will get back to you as soon as possible. Or, get in touch with me on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.