My son was standing at the edge of the hotel pool in Playa del Carmen, staring at the water like it might swallow him whole. He had been terrified of swimming for years. We had tried lessons back in Atlanta. We had tried patience, encouragement, and every gentle approach I could think of. Nothing worked.
But something about being here, in this place where we knew no one and had no routines to fall back on, made him willing to try again. He stepped in. Then he kicked. Then he swam.
That moment changed more than his relationship with water. It changed how I thought about fear, trust, and what I was willing to let go of to let my kids grow.
Why We Chose Playa del Carmen for Worldschooling
We left Atlanta and flew straight to Cancun with a plan to stay in Playa del Carmen for a month. I had been researching Mexico for a while, drawn to how accessible it felt compared to other international destinations. Direct flights. Familiar enough culturally that the transition wouldn’t feel jarring. Affordable enough that we could stretch our budget without constant stress.
Playa del Carmen specifically made sense because it was walkable. We didn’t need a car. The beach was close. Many people spoke English, though we were already learning Spanish and wanted the kids to practice. The infrastructure felt manageable for a single parent traveling with two young kids.
I wasn’t looking for a resort experience or a vacation. I was looking for a place where we could live, work, and learn without the weight of American systems dictating how we spent our days. Worldschooling in Playa del Carmen gave us exactly that.
The cost of living was low enough that I could breathe financially. The rhythm of the town was slow enough that we could settle into routines without feeling rushed. Everything we needed was within walking distance, and the beach became part of our daily life instead of something we had to schedule.
Our first week in Playa del Carmen. We didn’t know yet how much this place would teach us.
The Day My Son Went Swimming With a Stranger
A few weeks into our stay, someone recommended a local tour guide who took families snorkeling to see sea turtles. My son had finally gotten comfortable swimming in the pool, but the ocean was a different challenge. I wasn’t sure he was ready.
The guide was patient and experienced. He worked with kids regularly. But I didn’t know him. And my son had just barely overcome years of fear around water. Sending him into the ocean with someone I had met an hour earlier felt risky in ways I couldn’t fully articulate.
But I said yes anyway.
I said yes because I realized my hesitation wasn’t about my son’s ability. It was about my own need to control the outcome. I was afraid something would go wrong, and I wanted to be the one managing every step so I could intervene if needed. But that protective instinct was also limiting what he could experience.
I watched him walk into the water with the guide, and I knew he was going to be okay. He came back an hour later, talking about sea turtles and coral reefs and asking when we could go again. He had studied marine life in a way no textbook could replicate, observing ecosystems in real-time while building confidence in his own body.
That moment taught me something I had been resisting in my own life. I didn’t have to do everything myself. And more importantly, trying to do everything myself was keeping both of us smaller than we needed to be.
The day he stopped being afraid and started exploring.
What Playa del Carmen Taught Me About My Business
I run three businesses. A family marketplace. A consulting practice. A media brand. Before we left for Mexico, I was managing all of it alone because I thought that was what being a founder required. I made every decision. Handled every problem. Responded to every fire. I told myself it was about quality control, but really it was about fear.
Fear that if I delegated, something would go wrong. Fear that no one else could do it the way I would. Fear that loosening my grip meant losing control entirely.
Watching my son go into the ocean with that guide showed me how flawed that thinking was. He didn’t need me hovering. He needed someone with expertise who could take him further than I could on my own. And I needed to trust that the outcome would be better because I wasn’t trying to manage every variable myself.
When we got back from that snorkeling trip, I started rethinking how I was structuring my work. I began trusting my team with decisions I had been holding too tightly. I stopped treating delegation like a risk and started seeing it as the only way to build something sustainable.
Learning to trust my village and community became central to how I approached both parenting and business. I couldn’t do everything alone, and pretending I could was costing me more than I realized.
Worldschooling in Playa del Carmen gave me the distance I needed to see that pattern clearly. I wasn’t burned out yet, but I was close. The change in environment forced me to confront what wasn’t working before it broke completely.
My Daughter and the Sandcastles
While my son was learning to swim and exploring underwater ecosystems, my daughter was building. Every morning, she would head to the beach with her bucket and shovel and spend at least an hour working in the sand. She was three years old, but her focus was remarkable.
She didn’t just pile sand into mounds. She designed structures. Created moats. Built walls and tunnels, and elaborate layouts that had a clear intention behind them. She would narrate what she was making as she worked, explaining the purpose of each section and how it all connected.
I started calling her my little architect. She approached the sand the way someone approaches a blueprint, testing ideas and adjusting when something didn’t work. It wasn’t about making something pretty. It was about problem-solving through construction, using her hands to figure out what held and what collapsed.
Watching her build reminded me that learning doesn’t need a curriculum. She wasn’t following instructions or completing assignments. She was experimenting with physics, spatial reasoning, and creative design because the environment invited her to try. That’s what child-led learning while traveling looks like in practice.
An hour of focused building. Every single day.
Why Playa del Carmen Worked for Us
We stayed in Playa del Carmen for a month, and by the end, I understood why so many families choose Mexico for worldschooling. It wasn’t just the affordability or the proximity to the United States, though both mattered. It was how the place invited a different pace.
Everything was walkable. We didn’t need to drive anywhere, which meant the kids had more independence. They could walk to the beach. Navigate the streets. Practice Spanish with shop owners. The built environment supported autonomy in ways that suburban Atlanta never did.
The beach became part of our routine instead of a special occasion. My son swam every day. My daughter built every day. I worked from cafes with reliable wifi and decent coffee. We fell into rhythms that felt sustainable rather than exhausting.
The expat and local community were welcoming without being insular. We met other families traveling with children internationally, some worldschooling long-term and others just testing the idea. We also connected with Mexican families who showed us parts of the culture we wouldn’t have found on our own.
Cost was a factor, but it wasn’t the only reason we stayed. We stayed because the life we were building there felt more aligned with what we actually wanted than what we had left behind in the United States. For families considering affordable destinations for extended travel, Mexico offers a rare combination of accessibility, infrastructure, and cultural richness.
The moment fear turned into freedom. He never stopped jumping after this.
What We Carried Forward From Playa del Carmen
We eventually left Playa del Carmen and continued traveling, but the lessons from that month stayed with us. My son kept swimming. My daughter kept building. And I kept practicing trust in ways that reshaped how I approached both parenting and work.
Worldschooling in Playa del Carmen taught me that stepping back doesn’t mean abandoning responsibility. It means creating space for growth that can’t happen when you’re trying to control every outcome. My son needed an expert swimmer, not his anxious mother hovering at the edge of the pool. My businesses needed competent collaborators, not a founder doing everything out of fear.
Mexico was accessible in ways that made the transition easier, but what kept us there was how it shifted our internal landscape. We weren’t just visiting a new place. We were learning how to live differently, and that education extended far beyond geography.