Seeing What Has Been Built Already

It's important to reflect on what's already been learned: to think, what paths have I already crossed? If one's past experiences are not attended to with care, key lessons from experience are often overlooked.
   Experience can be thought to be a barometer, in the sense that it can tell a person what has worked in the past. Sometimes, experiences are fraught with prejudice, and one needs to question how they understood or interpreted those experiences. This is why an over-reliance on "pure" experience can sometimes lead to a sense of not being able to get out of established ways of thinking. It's as if I am too bound by what I saw and thought in the past, and this can lead to feelings of being overly attached to those interpretations.
   Each time I read a sutra, for example, the meaning is going to change according to my practice and understanding. If I simply said, "Well, I have already seen this, and I don't need to read it again", I will naturally feel that I don't need to read it again. But the problem is that when I open a page I am reading it with a new set of conditions and previous experiences. I can no longer ascribe to the belief that I already crossed that river, when in fact it's a new experience completely. While I can use the learning from the past to assess the new experience, it simply won't be the same experience at all.
   That having been said, being able to see what I have built from past experiences, efforts or learning, can give me some confidence to push forward and be open to new experiences. I am not a blank slate, but rather my mind has the capacity to integrate new experiences into already existing (and valued) experiences. In this way, I can trust in my capacity to learn, based on reflecting on the ways I have learned in the past.