The Vedas refer to the impressions of experiences that accumulate in our energy bodies as "sanskaras". Other traditions sometimes refer to them as "cords". Again, we have various branches of the sciences and ancient beliefs echoing each other. As wild as it sounds to our materialistic science-biased minds, the ghost really is in the machine, and it carries memories of our ancestors' experiences and coping strategies. How much of that could also be related to past lives? Do we live again as our descendants? Those accounts that have been surfacing in recent years of confirmable evidence of past lives suggest that this is not necessarily the case, but doesn't rule out the possibility of it's happening some of the time...but that is another branching of the tree, to be explored at another time.
Returning to the importance of perception and reaction in determining our ability to deal with our life experiences and make better choices for ourselves, breaking destructive patterns and adopting constructive ones, involves changing our thoughts first.
Thoughts are as potent as actions, because they are actions in potential, and they steer the energy of our attention toward or away from outcomes that have consequences to everyone- whether we know them or not. And here is where Quantum Physics locks into another side of the equation: every atom in the multiverse, no matter how distant, knows and experiences what is happening to every other atom.