Working from anywhere gives you freedom. Having a home base, with familiar faces and a table where there is always someone to talk to, is what turns a season in Playa into a life.
Every season, Playa del Carmen welcomes hundreds of people who work online: designers, developers, consultants, creators. They come for the sea, the weather and a town where everything is close by. And many of them discover something that wasn't in the plan: what they miss most isn't the office. It's the people.
In 2013, Mark Manson wrote about the less photographed side of nomad life. He had originally written the piece for CNN, which asked him to tone it down, so he published the full version on his own blog. His point was simple: when you change cities every few weeks, you lose your roots, and relationships tend to stay on the surface. You meet a lot of people, but almost no one for long enough.
What it takes for a friendship to happen
Ten years later, Manson came back to the subject from a different angle: how to make friends as an adult. He sums up what the research keeps finding. Friendships grow out of three things: being close by, seeing each other often, and opening up a little more each time. He also points to what makes it harder as the years pass: adult life fills up with work, family and errands, and the hours that used to be spare stop being spare.
For anyone who works while traveling, all three conditions are hard to meet. You switch cafés, apartments and cities. Nobody sees you twice.
A coworking space brings all three together
A good coworking space solves exactly that. Not by magic, but by design:
- Proximity: you share tables, a kitchen and coffee with the same people.
- Repetition: faces repeat day after day, and the "hi" of the first week becomes a real conversation by the third.
- Trust: between one coffee and the next come the real questions: what are you working on, what brought you to Playa, what would you like to do here.
On top of that come the gatherings with a purpose: lunches, workshops and conversations with local business owners, like the Mesa Kiin. They are the excuse to meet the people who live here all year, not just those passing through.
How to build community in Playa if you're here for a season
- Choose a home base. Working from the same place every day is what lets faces repeat.
- Go on the same days and at the same times. Consistency does more than any event.
- Say yes to the first invitation. The Friday lunch, the workshop, the conversation table.
- Share what you know. Offering a talk or helping with something from your field is the fastest way for people to get to know you.
- Stay for a full season. From November to April, Playa is at its best; two or three months in one place is enough for a friendship to settle in.
- Keep in touch when you leave. The friends you make one season are the ones who welcome you back the next.
Your home base in Playa del Carmen
At Kiin Hub, in Playacar, professionals who live in Playa work alongside others who come for a season. We have desks in a shared area, private offices, a meeting room and a community that gets together at the Mesa Kiin and in workshops. If you're arriving in Playa or planning your next season, message us from kiinhubcowork.com and come meet us.
Sources: Mark Manson, "The Dark Side of the Digital Nomad", July 10, 2013; and "How to Make Friends as an Adult", March 1, 2023.
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