While honoring mom today — and you should be if you have a mother or other significant nurturing woman in your life — it’s also a time to consider the work mothers do.

It can be measured in monetary terms — one survey pegged the work of a stay-at-home mom as worth $185,000 a year in cooking, cleaning, child-rearing, housework, taxi-driving and everything else that is asked of them.

But there is more to the value of the work of mother that goes beyond pay. It’s a priceless gem to society when it’s done well.

The true value of a mother is found in the children they rear, not in a spotless house or a good meal, though those are nice to have and teach valuable skills and self-respect to children.

Mothers lead the next generation of leaders of business, communities and nations. Good mothers set an example of selflessness, about the value of putting one’s soul and heart into the development of another individual.

If you think about it, there is no mother without a child, and there’s the value of motherhood, and we’re not merely relating to biology.

Anna Jarvis, a girl from Grafton, W.Va., hopefully had that in mind when she pushed for a national drive to have Mother’s Day in the early 20th century. She pushed the idea to the point where President Woodrow Wilson declared the first national Mother’s Day in 1914.

And it is in that spirit that you should honor your mother, stepmother, aunt or foster parent or grandmother, whoever the woman is who made a valuable mark on your life.

Most of all, be sure she knows you appreciate that invaluable measure of herself that she provided to your life.

Ask anyone, no matter how young or old, who has lost their mother what their life is like without her.

And be sure to share your feelings about her value while she is still alive to hear it.

Happy Mother’s Day.