work and play together regularly. Sometimes a new job provides this opportunity if the other workers are family oriented and feel as though they have a great deal in common. If your couple is similar to them, it may be easy to become involved. You can also find a community related to an activity your couple likes to do, such as hiking, biking, cooking, or traveling. Once you are participating in this community, you might encourage the others to share their dreams and visions of what works and what doesn't in their couples.
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A ready-made community of people in relationships can be hard to find. Building such a peer group may take some time and energy, but in the long run it will produce a secure base for you and your partner. Just as Carol and Conrad were able to turn their vision of a great neighborhood into a reality, you can create a couples community by beginning with the commitment to do so.
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One couple at a time: Begin by finding one couple with whom you feel comfortable or with whom you seem to have something in common. It might be that you have children who are the same age or attend the same school, or that one member of each couple works at the same place, or that you often run into each other at the store. Look especially at how they seem to be together as a couple. They may be individually fascinating, but with the goal of a couples community in mind, it is important to look for interesting couples. Invite them to do something with the two of you so that you can get acquainted. As this relationship develops, you might consciously talk about which other couples your group might like to get to know better. Plan an outing togethercamping, museum hopping, or a movie. Be sure that you use some of the time to talk about your couple, especially your visions about how you would like to be in the future. You might talk about having children, retiring, or
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