This week is America Saves Week. It’s a great opportunity to look at your savings goals, from vacation to retirement, and determine if you’re on track or could use a little motivation. Trust me, most of us could use the extra motivation. There isn’t a week dedicated to emphasizing savings because we all do it naturally. Do you remember the fable of the Grasshopper and the Ant? The ant toils and sweats and works all summer long, preparing for the cold, harsh winter. The grasshopper enjoys the summer, surrounded by food and content…until winter.

When it comes to our finances, a lot of us start out like the grasshopper. Once you’ve landed a good job and start seeing a weekly check come in, it’s pretty easy to get into the habit of spending what you earn. Get a raise? Maybe it’s time for a new car. Thankfully we’ve all started to realize that we’ll need to start copying the ant if we want to enjoy a comfortable lifestyle in retirement…or enjoy retirement at all. The good news? You’re not saving just to survive winter, like the ant was. You’re saving to enjoy retirement, with all the travel, family, and fun that goes with it.

I’m nearing retirement. I talk about it a LOT. I write about it a LOT. My poor family is subjected to my musings and advice on a weekly if not daily basis, and here’s what I’ve noticed. Young people just entering the workforce know that retirement is important. People in their late 40s and 50s definitely know that retirement is important, and they’re starting to save in earnest. It’s the young families, the 30s crowd, that seem to be missing out. Life is very busy at that age, and when you have so much on your to-do list in just the next few months, it’s difficult to look beyond that to the next 50 years. But it’s important.

So I look at this week as an opportunity to pester and aggravate my children a little bit more about their savings plans. Even if it’s not for retirement, there are so many reasons to have a savings back up. Job loss, a medical emergency, or even an unexpected home repair is a lot easier to handle when you have a cushion in your savings account, and you won’t be scrambling to secure a loan or paying with plastic to cover your costs. Who wants to pay interest on a broken leg or a new transmission? Not me.

Of course, I have some work of my own to do on savings. Although I’m on track to retire this year, I could still use some extra cash in an emergency fund, and I wouldn’t mind having enough money saved to pay for our celebratory vacation after the big retirement day in July. No matter where you are financially, making sure that you’re always saving some of your money and paying yourself first should be a priority. You pay your other bills, right? Don’t you owe yourself that same courtesy?

So this week, I’m going to start putting back a few bucks every day. Instead of a coffee or a breakfast burrito, I’m going to hold onto that cash and transfer it to a special savings account. And when I have enough saved to go snorkeling off the coast this summer, I’m pretty sure I’ll be a lot happier with that than I would be with a quick drive thru breakfast. Are you going to start saving this week?