Don't Watch Your Equity.... How Do you Do This?

I have a system that I am very successful with, so much that I have actually removed price from my charts and just watch the angles of lines and momentum. Before this I switched to HA candles so that the up and down movements of the standard candles would not cause me to make rash decisions.. close early, or jump in on a whim etc...

I am now finding that looking at my balance in my account is starting to affect my positions and trying to hold them according to plan. In an effort to control my mind and just trade my system, has anyone used any sort of method in their trading to avoid looking at their account balance or watching their equity hop all over the place?

I find I make more sound decisions, hold positions longer for larger profits the less I look at my account balance and the less I watch the charts hop up and down. I am looking for a way to hide my balance/equity in MT4 and even maybe remove price as say $500 and rather just show it as a pip.

Anyhow, what methods have you guys used to control and manage watching the ticker? When your trading standard lots and have 5 positions open it's very stressful. One very good trader I trade with - We created a slack channel to discuss our trade ideas. He doesn't even watch his balance for an entire week. Claims he just trades and looks at his P&L on Friday... b/c he says if he saw his drawdown throughout the week it would kill his effectiveness in his plan. He's a true pro and cleans house every week. Though I know he has some big draw downs on intra-day, but he's always putting up crazy numbers week over week.

So... what do you do?

Know where you are in and out before you trade is probably the best way

I think if you are trading based upon emotion then you will likely have issues

Surely this is common knowledge?

I feel your pain. My trading aways gets worse when I start getting obsessed with my P&L. The best trading happens when I just stick to the trading plan.

Things I have tried over the years:

- removing P&L from the screen
- removing equity from the screen
- setting SL & TP at trade open
- walking away from the screens
- forbidding myself to look at lower timeframes
- setting an alarm for when I allow myself to look at the price (e.g. hourly or 4-hourly)
- going for a run
- thinking of trades in term of xR rather than $amount (although this has had limited success as I just start obsessing about xR!)
- only looking at the equity curve at set times e.g. weekly or monthly (although I know what it is at any time, this still helps strangely)

The best one of all is a mantra or strong internal dialogue that tells me to zoom out my perspective and not obsess about individual trades. It takes practice but it is very powerful. Whenever I lapse in this my trading definitely gets worse! Here's a post a wrote about it a while back:
https://www.thistradinglife.com/post...mantra-mindset

If anyone has any other top tips, I would love to hear.

You know, for some people your approach may seem absurd and fundamentally wrong. And this is normal. But if you see profit and everything turns out exactly as you like and you see profit, then what is the problem? I know many traders, who are hindered by the abundance of indicators or some specific settings, and they really use something primitive and ordinary in their work, but they get a stable profit and do not plan to change anything in the near future. In all circumstances, you should choose something that provides you with comfort in the market. And in this sense the advice of your colleagues, even the most honest advice can be absolutely unnecessary and meaningless, just wish you success and peace of mind in your work.

In MT4 press Ctrl+T, problem solved

And btw, you have no business looking at the floating P/L !! you shoul be focused on the chart itself, reading the price and waiting, thats all; also get a trade manager EA of some kind, that way you can click buy/sell and just move on with your life and let the EA handle the trade for you

Money comes from following the right process, not watching it float + or - in the bottom window =)

If you feel that something is not going according to plan and you don't see any prospects, then try to find another strategy soon. This can be tried out on a demo, plus you need to study your personal statistics in detail to see at which points you see the most profit. Well, if you understand that everything is fine, that you're just tired or under a lot of stress - then give yourself some time to rest and go back to the usual format of work.
I will also agree with the opinion that you need to work because you are comfortable and the results of your work can only be evaluated by profit. If this is the case and the percentage of profitable deals is higher than that of not profitable ones, then everything is fine.

Think you really peace of horrible krep honestly; I need to say unfortunately

I mean you, not sure message clear

No sorry I mean you, real krep always the same

I think that working blindly in the market probably makes no sense at all. Because it will turn into a game on emotions, and it cannot be called a business and it seems to me that it only increases the probability of loss.
Although probably someone managed to do something reckless and abrupt and get a great income - but it can't be called a system. It's more like a lucky set of circumstances.
For me a trader is a person who is always learning, always trying to get new experience and always thinking. Impulsiveness in business is not the solution. The ones who win in business are those who know how to look ahead and who know how to wait when it is really necessary.

Sometimes it seems to traders that they act intuitively and still get a great profit. But it seems to me that in most cases this is not the case. Just when you already have some knowledge and experience and you know what's going on in the market - sometimes you really notice some profitable positions even without detailed analysis. It's a kind of automation of a skill and it seems to me to be a normal development in any business. At first it's hard for you and you spend a lot of time making a decision. But over time it becomes much easier and you start to navigate and find something you need much faster - that's professionalism.

It is important to know your P/L if you are manually closing your trades or managing them instead of using a hard stop.

If you are using a hard stop then watching your P/L really does not matter unless you plan on moving your stop, in which case you should ask yourself
"why am I even using a stop loss in the first place?"

It is also important to know your P/L if you plan on opening more positions, this is because you do not want to exceed your own personal predefined risk parameters.

If you plan your risk beforehand, and you are comfortable with losing then you wont watch your P/L so much.

It really has to do with personality and psychology, for some maybe it won't effect them, for others may lose sleep. With practice and after losing a lot you will stop doing it so much since it is not beneficial to you in any way.

One more thing, instead of watching your P/L watch the charts, and study to look for more opportunities or try and learn more, if you are in front of the charts you may as well use your time wisely.

If you have got to the level where you no longer what to see the price only your charts then ti means hta you are an experienced trader. T can be noted that some of the traders easily distracted by the process inthe charts and that why when they are trading they are nervous because they are afrad that they may lose all of that money in an instant. If you don't see then you don't have to worry so much and you can then be able to make a clearer decision of whether to buy or sell. On the other hand you may have had a different reason for wanting to remove the price from your charts and it si a personal thing because it will not work for everyone.