please help... I'm looking for the source for the following quote:

you can't know where you're going until you know where you've been

..or something like that

This is a variant of the quote attributed to George Santayana-"Those who are unaware of history are destined to repeat it." [This is the quote which, I believe, appears on the frieze at the entrance to the main library at the University of Colorado.] Anyway, the theme of acknowledging the antecedents and preceding events of one's existence as guides to the future is well-developed in numerous arenas. The Platonic ideal of always being in a state of becoming, of building on that which went before in order to more fully realize the future, is one early example. The American trancendentalists, especially Emerson, spoke at length about the necessity to grasp the past as a guide to the future. Wordsworth talked at length about the "aching joys and dizzying raptures" of past youth which informed his life as a man maturing and establishing his way in the world. In modern psychological and behaviorist dialog, the nature vs. nurture argument touches on the role of past events as causal in current or future events. Most every major religion has traditional rites and sacraments which are rooted to the past and which provide a sense of time and place for adherents. The continuation of those time-worn rites ensures a certain amount of connectedness to the certain past in an uncertain future.

As to an unequivocal source of the quote, I am afraid I am not much use. However, I would encourage your looking at any of the sources I've mentioned as a place to begin your own personal inquiry into the past as prologue to the future.

The quote above Norlin Library at the Universtiy of Colorado is actually, "Who Knows only his own Generation remains always a child." I have read this quote everyday for 5 years. I believe the quote is from Cicero.

I think it's pretty much a cliche that has been incorporated into a lot of people's remarks...

If you want to know your past, look into your present conditions. If you want to know your future, look into your present actions.
--Buddhist Saying
http://home.att.net/~quotesexchange/past.html
or "Padmisambha"
http://iqml.tripod.com/author/padmisam.htm
etc. http://www.cycnet.com/englishcorner/digest/

As the old cliché goes, you can't know where you are going until you know where you have been

"Look back to where you have been, for a clue to where you are going"

"Not only know thyself. Know where you have been. Know where you are going. Know the place of 'all knowing'. Know the present moment."
http://goldenlight.zoovy.com/category/quotations

It is said that history repeats itself, but we are only doomed to relive our past if we fail to learn from it. The past is not a map to where you are going, it's a record of where you have been. Its purpose is not to drag you back through emotional muck, but to serve you best by reminding you of lessons learned so you can avoid them in the future.
~from React or Respond by Kimberly and Tom Goodwin
http://www.cyberquotations.com/articles/react_or_respond.htm

Do not run through life
so fast that you forget
not only where you have been,
but also where you are going.
~from "Peace" by author unknown
http://www.thehrdgroup.com/thinkers_i.htm
or "You Are Unique" by same
http://www.sfpnn.com/PNNs/PNN2000/03102000.htm

May you have the hindsight to know where you have been, the foresight to know where you are going, and the insight to know when you have gone too far.
~unattributed
http://www.spuddie.net/inspquotes.htm

He knows the universe and doesn't know himself.
~La Fontaine, Fables, VIII., 26 Democrite et les Abderitains

"Men must be taught as if you taught them not,
And things unknown proposed as things forgot."
~Pope, Essay on Criticism, pt.iii, 1, 15

"The most difficult thing in life is to know yourself."
~Thales

"Learn to know yourself, and go down in yourself."
~Pierre Corneille

"Almost every wise saying has an opposite one, no less wise, to balance it."
~Santayana, Essays

Hey, my name's Elisa too...

ANYWAY
I know Will Smith says it in Hitch.
Of course it's not the first place it's been said

but maybe you heard it there.
[When he's at Ellis Island with Eva Mendez, showing her the book of signatures, ya know??]

Maybe that helps??

Its the beginning of the Will 2k music video.

The video starts with Will addressing his guests by saying "My daddy told me one time, you don't know where you're going until you know where you've been".

Did'n Yoda say something similar in Return of the Jedi?