Logan Ayliffe Blog

Moving from the USA to the Netherlands

2025-10-18T08:39:31Z

I occasionally get messages with some version of this same question:

“Hey, I’m thinking about moving to the Netherlands. How did you do it? Was it hard? What’s it like for someone in tech?”

This post is a short summary of my answers to this type of question.

Note: As you are no doubt aware, we live in chaotic times. The political attitudes regarding immigration are in flux. When in doubt, always consider information from the IND to be leading.

Visa Pathways

I know of a few ways for Americans to move to the Netherlands. Some are much easier than others.

1. Be Recruited by a Dutch Company (Highly Skilled Migrant Visa)

If you can get hired by a Dutch company before moving, they can sponsor your visa as a Highly Skilled Migrant (kennismigrant).

The company must be a recognized sponsor with the Dutch Immigration and Naturalisation Service (IND).
IND: Highly skilled migrant permit

Once hired, the process is straightforward — your employer handles most of the paperwork. They will in most cases also cover the costs of the move, which are significant.

You may qualify for the 30% ruling, a tax break for certain foreign workers. It’s under review and may change, but worth checking.
Netherlands Tax Service - Can I apply for the Expat Scheme (30% facility) if I come to work in the Netherlands?

2. Start a Business Under the Dutch-American Friendship Treaty (DAFT)

If you freelance or run your own business, the Dutch-American Friendship Treaty (DAFT) is an excellent option. It lets U.S. citizens start a business and live in the Netherlands with relatively low investment requirements. The IND recently (2024) made this process even easier.

3. The Zoekjaar (Orientation Year) Visa

This is the path I took. The zoekjaar visa is for recent Masters or PhD graduates from top universities (including many in the U.S.) who want to look for work in the Netherlands.You can apply within three years of earning a master’s or PhD from an eligible university.

Orientation year for highly educated persons

It gives you one year in the Netherlands to find a job without already being employed. Once you find a job, the visa automatically converts to a Highly Skilled Migrant permit.

Upsides:

You can move first, then look for work.
Your spouse or registered partner can usually join you -- but you have to show the IND that you have enough money in the bank to support the spouse for a year.
When we did this, the amount was something like $20,000.00.

Downsides:

You don’t qualify for the 30% ruling.
Renting housing is harder without a job contract. We used AirBNB for almost 6 months.

Still, it worked. I arrived, found an entry-level tech role and used it as a foothold to build a long-term career here.

Warning: Start and Finish in the Same Country

One mistake we made early on: we started our visa paperwork at the Dutch Embassy in Washington, D.C. — but before it was approved, we moved to the Netherlands (U.S. citizens can stay 90 days visa-free). This was November of 2021 and it was just a logistics thing -- COVID lockdowns + selling our home in South Philly meant we needed to do things in this order.

When the IND reviewed our case, they said that because the application began outside the Netherlands, it had to be completed outside the Netherlands. Their initial instruction was to fly back to the U.S. to finish it. This would have been dangerous and potentially impossible, since this was happening during the COVID lockdowns of late 2021 / early 2022.

We convinced them to let us complete it in Luxembourg instead — but it was a bureaucratic headache and delayed everything.

So:If you start your visa application abroad, finish it abroad. Don’t move to the Netherlands mid-process.

Other Miscellaneous Thoughts

The Tech Market

Generally easier than in the U.S. — especially in software, data, and infrastructure roles. Many Dutch tech companies are used to hiring internationally. There is also a shortage of skilled tech workers in the Netherlands.

Pay: Lower than U.S. tech salaries. Entry-level roles often start around €45–55K/year (~$50–60K).
Work-life balance: Excellent. 36-hour workweeks are common, and “vacation” actually means vacation. I get 40 days of paid vacation per year, for example.

If you’re burned out by U.S. work culture, this is a major quality-of-life upgrade. At least it was for me.

If you want to work in the public sector at the intersection of education and research, I can highly recomend my employer SURF. Look for job openings that are located in the Amsterdam Science Park location (as opposed to Utrecht) because that location is more international and will use English in daily work.

SURF Vacancies

Housing

The housing crisis in the Netherlands is serious. It’s not impossible to find a place, it is really difficult especially in Amsterdam, Utrecht, and The Hague. We ended up with a tiny place in Bussum for our first couple years, before finding a fantastic house in Amersfoort. Basically, unless you are independently wealthy, I don't recommend trying to live in Amsterdam.

Landlords rarely rent to people without a permanent contract.
Be prepared to compromise on location or space.
Consider smaller cities (like Eindhoven, Groningen, or Amersfoort) for better availability.

→ Government of the Netherlands: Housing and renting
→ IamExpat Housing Guide

Language and Integration

Almost everyone speaks English, but learning Dutch makes life much easier and opens doors professionally.

Aim for B1 level as soon as you can, ideally before moving.
It helps with bureaucracy, integration, and eventually, permanent residence.

After living in the Netherlands for five years on a valid residence permit, you can apply for permanent residency or citizenship. But for citizenship, you would have to renounece your US citizenship. So probably permanent resident is the move. The process includes inburgering (civic integration), which means passing Dutch language and culture exams.

→ IND: Permanent residence permit
→ Inburgeren in Nederland

Politics

The Netherlands is safer than the US but not perfect. Do some reading through English-language Dutch news so you have a realistic sense of the country.

→ NL Times
→ DutchNews.nl

If I Could Do It Over

I’d aim for either the Highly Skilled Migrant route (if you can land a job before moving) or the DAFT route (if you can freelance or consult).
The zoekjaar worked fine, but it came with more housing stress and paperwork headaches than I’d recommend if you have other options.

Important Reference Links

These are official or widely trusted resources:

Immigration and Naturalisation Service (IND)](https://ind.nl/en) — official info on all residence permits and visa options
Business.gov.nl — Dutch government portal for entrepreneurs and expats
IamExpat.nl — practical guides on jobs, housing, and life in the Netherlands
Expatica Netherlands — general guides on work, housing, and integration

If you’re seriously considering the move and have specific questions, feel free to reach out — I’m happy to share what I can or point you toward the right resources. Email is the best route to reach me.

Mental Health Inteventions Tier List

2024-01-06T09:37:21Z

In December of 2019, I was feeling the intense pressure of working two jobs full-time while also completing my Bachelor's degree in Cognitive Science: Computation and Cognition and my Master's degree in Computer and Information Technology. I was pulling about 90 hours per week, and had been for about 2.5 years.

My doctor and I decided to try adding an anti-anxiety medication to my routine. Unfortunately, this ended up causing a permanent neurological condition called oromandibular dystonia, and I had to stop taking all medications. So I went from needing extra help to losing the help I was already getting.

Enter March 2020, which you may remember as the very good month where nothing bad happened at all. 🫠

So I needed to find some new ways to try and help my brain out. The following is a near-exhaustive list of the mental health interventions I have tried, ranked by tier.

S-Tier 🌟

No Alcohol
Exercise - Weightlifting
Move from the USA to The Netherlands
Airpod Pro Noise Cancelling Earbuds
Reduce Labor Committment from 90hrs/wk to 40hrs/wk
Increase Sex Life
Leave Twitter

A-Tier 👍

No Caffeine
Sleep 8+ Hours per Night
Exercise - Walking, Biking
Healthy Diet
6 Month Vacation
Daily Water Intake >= 2.5L
Self-Educate via Peer Reviewed Medical Literature
Therapy - HealthyGamer ADHD Module

B-Tier 🆗

Mindfulness Meditation
Reduce Violent Media Consumption
Daily Multivitamin
Daily Stretching
Strengthening Personal Relationships

C-Tier 🤔

Therapy - CBT
Therapy - Parts Work

Photos and Videos from Dad Visit 2023

2023-12-26T14:11:29Z

My father traveled from Asheville, North Carolina, United States of America to the Netherlands to celebrate my 40th birthday and visit with me and my wife.

While he was visiting we had a great time showing him around. We had a wonderful dinner on my birthday, visited the Rijksmuseum, toured around the canals of Amsterdam on a boat, explored a serious Dutch windmill, watched The Sting and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and had a great time just hanging out.

Here's some photos and videos from the trip.

Bussum Area Nature and Animals

Amsterdam -- Street and Metro

Rijksmuseum

Birthday

Amsterdam Canals

Molen van Sloten Amsterdam

Working through the healthygamer.gg ADHD module

2023-09-22T10:23:34Z

I first encountered Dr. Alok Kanoija (Dr. K in the common parlance of his audience) via his YouTube channel. I was immediately struck by his approach to mental health, which is to say that he's a psychiatrist who is also a gamer, and who talks about mental health issues in the context of gaming and gaming culture. I also really appreciated that he brings both his Western psychological training and his Eastern spiritual training to bear on his work. I've been watching his videos for a few months now, and I've found them to be very helpful and informative.

Some links to videos that I found especially valuable:

After watching and appreciating his YouTube content for a while, I researched more about his organization healthygamer.gg and learned about Dr. K's Guide to Mental Health. I was intrigued by the idea of a guided, interactive, online course on mental health, and I was especially interested in the ADHD module. I've been diagnosed with ADHD for a few years now, and I've been on medication for it for about a year. I've found the medication to be very helpful, but I've also found that I still have a lot of work to do to understand my ADHD and to learn how to live with it.

I purchased the ADHD module for $20 and have slowly worked through the whole thing over the last few months. It's a really nicely designed interface and system that gradually guides you through the videos and their accompanying resources and worksheets.

The ADHD module was really helpful for me along a few different axes.

I was pretty familiar with the neuroscientific properties of ADHD, but there were a few insights that were new to me and really helpful. For example, the understanding that the pre-frontal cortices of the brain are, in the context of ADHD, more like brakes than an engine. So when stimulant medication operates on those cortices, it enables the patient to inhibit and suppress signals coming from places like the amygdala or the limbic system. This is why stimulant medication can be so helpful for people with ADHD, because it allows them to inhibit the signals that are causing them to be distracted or succumb to impulses.
I really appreciated the deeper insight into various meditation practices. Like many Westerners, my only real exposure to meditation has in the mindfulness genre via apps like Headspace. My meditation practice has been helpful over the past ~6 years or so, but it has also been effortful the entire time and without much progress. Dr. K introduced me to alternative meditation practices that are more compatible with the ADHD cognitive fingerprint. For example sound meditation, which is a practice of focusing on the sounds around you and letting them wash over you. This is a much more natural practice for me, and I've found it to be much more effective and enjoyable. Here's a video I've been using for my sound meditation practice: Sound Meditation Temple Rin Standing Bell
I was not familiar with any Ayurvedic medicine, and I found the introduction to it to be really interesting. I'm not sure if I'll ever incorporate it into my life, but I'm glad to have learned about it. I also really appreciated the introduction to the concept of "samskaras", which are the mental impressions that we accumulate over the course of our lives. I've been thinking about this concept a lot since I first encountered it, and I've found it to be a helpful way to think about my own mental health and the mental health of others.

Overall, I think $20 for the ADHD module is an absolute bargain, and I highly recommend it to others who are on a journey to learn more about their ADHD or the ADHD of a child or loved one.

Cooking Music

2023-08-27T09:46:29Z

Since COVID started, my spouse and I cook just about every single meal we eat. We've gotten pretty good at it, and we've found that we enjoy it a lot more when we have some music playing. I have a playlist going with a mix of stuff we like to sing along to.

A lot of showtunes, a lot of Bo Burnham, some television stuff....it's all over the place. The playlist is growing over time -- some stuff gets overplayed and shuffle-skipped until it comes back around. That's how we use it -- shuffle and skip until we hit a song that sparks joy. Repeat for the ~ 30 minutes it takes to cook dinner. It's fun!

Here's the playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0tInC5mrhNuIl4ZkK1nGxy?si=ef99d774c4394d6a

Also, I'd be remiss if I did not credit Hank Green's Inexcusable Bops playlist which has been one major source of inspiration for this playlist.

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1EsozxnoOIr5u6iMfmobfh?si=d68b1449eda4496f

Book - Atlas of the Heart by Brené Brown

2023-08-27T09:46:29Z

I do not read a ton of non-fiction literature generally and I can count the number of self-help psychology books I’ve read on two hands. Yet when Atlas of the Heart came up in conversation with my friend Hannah I was immediately hooked by the premise.

Brown says:

Fifteen years ago, when we first introduced a curriculum based on my shame resilience research, we asked participants in the training workshops to list all of the emotions that they could recognize and name as they were experiencing them. Over the course of five years, we collected these surveys from more than seven thousand people.

The average number of emotions named across the surveys was three. The emotions were happy, sad, and angry.

When I think about this data, I think back to a quote from the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein that I came across in college: “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.” What does it mean if the vastness of human emotion and experience can only be expressed as mad, sad, or happy? What about shame, disappointment, wonder, awe, disgust, embarrassment, despair, contentment, boredom, anxiety, stress, love, overwhelm, surprise, and all of the other emotions and experiences that define what it means to be human?

...

Language is our portal to meaning-making, connection, healing, learning, and self-awareness. Having access to the right words can open up entire universes. When we don’t have the language to talk about what we’re experiencing, our ability to make sense of what’s happening and share it with others is severely limited. Without accurate language, we struggle to get the help we need, we don’t always regulate or manage our emotions and experiences in a way that allows us to move through them productively, and our self-awareness is diminished. Language shows us that naming an experience doesn’t give the experience more power, it gives us the power of understanding and meaning.

(emphasis mine)

I live with ADHD and Autistic traits. I have often felt like I am unable to control my emotions. In sitting with the premise of Brown’s book, I realized that I also struggle to identify my emotions and internal states . If you or someone you know has ADHD, this will be familiar. The hyper-focus that comes with an engaged ADHD brain can mean that internal signals to eat, drink, or use the bathroom get suppressed. Brown’s book attempts to provide the reader with the tools needed to identify internal emotions in detail. By understanding in more detail how I feel, I gain an increased ability to manage my emotions, communicate with others, and meaningfully connect with my relationships.

Atlas of the Heart is a deceptively simple book. It isn’t very long, and the writing is simple, clear, and straightforward. The revelations it contains, however, require time and space to digest. I listened to the audiobook once, then read through the physical book a couple of times. I found myself returning to particular sections as I strove to refine my emotional vocabulary. Ultimately I decided to put the book through my usual Progressive Summarization process so that I could learn the material and have a reference, a Codex of Human Emotion.

The result is a collection of thirteen markdown documents, each one corresponding to a chapter in the book. I use these as references during times of heightened emotion to continue building my emotional vocabulary and upgrading the resolution of my internal sensors.

Atlas of the Heart Chapter Notes

download: markdown or pdf

Redesigning and relaunching loganayliffe.com

2023-08-27T09:46:29Z

Yep, this is a blog launch announcement. And yep, it is 2023 and the blog-as-format is pretty dead. But I want a place to share what I'm working on, and endless scroll social media platforms do not spark joy. So here we are!

The primary purpose of my website has been to showcase my projects and CV to potential employers. This was critical when I was switching careers from restaurants to tech in the middle of a pandemic. I wanted to make sure that I was putting my best foot forward.

Fast-forward two years and I'm working in tech at a finance company in the Netherlands. I cleared the hurdle of getting my foot in the door in the tech industry. Now I have the luxury of treating my website as a personal project rather than only professional one.

On this reworked version of my website, I'll be:

Writing short TILs (Today I Learned) about things I've learned in my day-to-day, mostly tech-related.
Writing longer blog posts about projects I'm working on, life events, and so on.
Sharing completed projects - and I have some great ones in the pipeline!

I'm glad to have a place to share my thoughts and projects, and I hope you enjoy reading them. You can keep up with me by bookmarking this site, subscribing to the RSS feed, or following me on Mastodon.