If you don't think of the past as roots tying you down and preventing you from what you want to become, then you can use past experience as a guide of what to do (in cases you were successful) and what not to do (in cases where you failed). But other than that I agree we need to visualize what we want to become or what we want to achieve and make a plan of how to get there and follow/execute on that plan.
Yeah, the past is a guide for experience, but not necessarily a good one for becoming who we want to be. If we anchor ourselves to that past alone, without considering the future, we have a very limited scope.