I believe in giving the future a chance.

Sometimes people just look back and are sad about what is behind them. There is nothing wrong with this, but when the past is pondered over too much the future is robbed of its opportunities. As an example when my family moved to a new house I felt that it was worse because the good memories I had at my old house were not there, but in doing so I kind of made the good experiences at my new house more gray. Like if I was experiencing something I would compare it to different memories I had at my old house and would generally drag down the experience.

But this doesn't mean people should ignore the past, instead of thinking “part of my life before this was so much better then now so what's the point” a better mindset is “part of my life before this was so much better then now so I can work to get to that point” instead of a weight dragging someone down it can be a thing to look at as something to strive for. Having goals can help to focus on moving forward, and can help someone get to a better place in life.

The future is full of new experiences and this can be scary, but when we are scared of the future sometimes we miss the opportunities also in the future. if all our time is spent reminiscing then we won't push ourselves, someone can have opportunities and advantages but if they aren't motivated then they wont get as high as they can. But there's also a factor of learning from the past, we often hear the statement “if at first you don't succeed try try again” but in my experience it is better to change what you are doing and reflect before trying again, if you take time to reflect on what you did, and what possibly went wrong, it could make it easier when you try again. 

Their is a difference between being experienced and having an experience, to be experienced usually requires looking back and pondering on what someone have done before, and learning from it to the point where someone doesn't need to think “what did I do in the situation where it worked” but just knows what to do from the experiences they had. Having an experience does not usually ingrain itself in someone's mind, as someone who has had the experience with the intention of learning a skill or trait, as when someone watches or does something with the intention of learning they can see or notice things someone who is not trying to learn can not. 

So to restate I believe that the past should be used as a booster to lift someone up instead of something looked back upon as what is gone and wont come back and when someone looks upon the past with pessimism the future is robbed of opportunities and seems gray or monotone.