Taking P&L helped my trading a lot!!! I think that tracking $$$ in your screen fires up your fear&greed and prevents you from making objective decisions! Chinook Edit: Once you're over the consistantly profitable hump and nailed down the rules, this might to be as big of a problem.
A more apt question would be whether or not they keep a running tally of their wins and losses simultaneously with their play. Even then, however, the question is irrelevant.
My dad was a semi-professional player for a while so you'll appreciate my answer. But your question, as dbphoenix pointed out, does not have not the right focus, but what else is new from the beltway, huh? The question isn't whether a pro knows how much money he's got invested, whether it's in a trading account if he's a trader, medical equipment if he's a doctor, or the kitty if he's a poker player, but whether concentrating on the P&L throughout can be a pyschological hindrance or not. In response to your question, the answer is, a poker player knows how many chips are in his stack - at a glance. He knows how much he's got left to bet with for the game. He needs to know that to carry out playing that hand. But concentrating/focusing/continually calculating on how much he's ahead/behind is not material to the game at hand and instead there's the real serious need to concentrate on many other more pressing matters that must be kept in mind and juggled when playing poker. Without that, the P&L won't follow.
Guess I'm in that minority with you AAA. Flashboy, not trying to be sarcastic here, but it's REALLY up to you (what you want to watch). If you KNOW you have trading ideas that work, what does it matter?
Aside from the fact that doing what you're trying to do with less than a thousand dollars is - forgive me - nuts, you have so much going against you emotionally and psychologically that your best interests would most likely be served by your blowing out. Maybe then you would take the time to actually test your strategy to see if it is profitable and, if so, under what conditions and for what length of time. Until you have at a minimum done your homework in this regard, any attempt to untangle your discipline and emotional issues will be pointless. I don't know who's advising you, or if you're trying to listen to everybody, or if you're listening to anybody, but I suggest that you study Douglas' Trading in the Zone and Graifer's Techniques of Tape Reading, both of which are available from the library or through interlibrary loan. You're rapidly turning into another Gordon Gekko, and God knows you don't want that
This probably goes against the "Rules" as well, but here's what helped me. Make a couple of trades with 5 times your regular size. So if you're trading 1-lots, that would mean put on a 5-lot trade. Of course, use risk management/stops with this trade as you would with any. Once you see the P&L column move as fast as it will with 5x your regular size, you'll be pretty relaxed next time you put on a trade with your regular size. This will only work if your account is large enough to take the hit of 5x regular size. I already warned you, this goes against all the rules so don't flame me. -Fast
SHOW ME THE MONEY!!! I believe it was Marty Schwartz who revealed that he liked to get tens of thousands of dollars in cash and just handle it so that he could keep his mind on what was important.