In reality their bad experiences actually happened, but in their minds those experiences never occurred. Though they struggle in life on a daily basis because the problems of their past were never resolved, in their minds those problems never occurred. Some people refuse to accept any responsibility for their present life because of what happened in their past. They live in what I refer to as the victim mentality. Since they must be who they are because of their past experiences, they accept no responsibility for anything occurring in their lives, and they accept no responsibility to change themselves or their lives.
Some people own their past.
It serves no purpose to deny what actually happened. In the act of owning their past, they also accept responsibility for their present. They can make choices, they can grow, and both their present and their future can change. God wants us to own our past. God knows that the first step in being freed from our past is owning our past.