The rejection email is easy to blame.
So is the job posting with one qualification you don’t have, the editor who doesn’t respond to your pitch or the story you decided wasn’t good enough — only to watch another publication run it the next day.
But sometimes the person standing between a journalist and the opportunity is the actual journalist.
That was the uncomfortable truth Oct. 2 at the SPJ 2026 panel, “The Confidence Tax: Imposter Syndrome in Freelance Journalism.”
Panelists talk about the voice of self-doubt that can follow journalist throughout their careers. Photo by McKenna Manzo.
Four journalists — SPJ President Nicole DeCriscio, San Antonio Report journalist Laura Garcia, SPJ Phoenix Vice President Nicole Greason and freelance journalist Lauren Spates — talked candidly about the opportunities they almost talked themselves out of, despite years of experience and accomplishments.
The conversation was not simply about telling journalists to believe in themselves. It was about learning to recognize when self-doubt offers useful information and when it simply keeps them from trying.
“The thoughts can sound like facts,” Stacie Overton Johnson, moderator and chair of SPJ’s Freelance Community, told the audience.
That distinction became the thread running through the discussion: I have something to learn is not the same as I have no business trying.
For journalists, the difference can determine which stories get pitched, which jobs get applied for and which doors never get knocked on.
Greason learned that early in her career. After graduating from the University of Arizona in 1988, she was working at a small weekly newspaper in Wilcox, Ariz., when an editor in Tucson called and offered her a job editing a section.
There was just one problem. She had never been an editor. “I thought to myself, what have I done?” Greason said.
She called her mother for reassurance. Her mother reminded her that she was capable, trained and had been offered the job for a reason, so Greason took the job. Decades later, she still sees the same pattern in journalists who hesitate before opportunities.
Spates, a freelancer whose investigative work has received major recognition, described a similar battle despite a résumé many journalists would envy. She has won awards and co-authored a book that received national recognition.
Still, Spates said, she has struggled to get out of her own way. When another freelancer suggested she apply for SPJ’s Pulliam Fellowship, she almost didn’t.
“I would never have done that,” Spates said. “I would have talked myself out of it before I even tried.”
Spates applied. She did not get the fellowship, but what stayed with her was not the rejection, but what it taught her about taking the shot.
Instead of treating the rejection as proof that she wasn’t good enough, she decided to keep looking for someone who wanted the story. That mindset matters in freelance journalism, where rejection is often part of the job.
“You just have to keep pitching,” Spates said. “You’re going to hear no lot, but that doesn’t mean you stop. You just keep going until somebody says yes.”
DeCriscio knows that feeling from both sides of the journalism industry. After being fired from a nonprofit newsroom she helped build, she started freelancing while pursuing another journalism venture. In January 2026, she was encouraged to apply for a university position she initially questioned if she was qualified.
More than 30 people applied, and DeCriscio became one of two finalists. She didn’t get the job, but the experience forced her to confront the difference between rejection and failure and to recognize that not getting an opportunity doesn’t mean she wasn’t qualified to pursue it.
“It’ll be a no if I don’t,” DeCriscio said. “If I don’t take the shot, I already know the answer is no.”
That idea became one of the panel’s most repeated messages: Not trying is its own kind of rejection. Still, panelists were careful not to reduce every feeling of inadequacy to something journalists can simply think away.
Sometimes the problem is not inside someone’s head, but rather the newsroom, industry or the hiring system has created a real barrier.
Greason, whose career has included journalism, public relations and higher education, said those structural and societal barriers can contribute to imposter feelings, particularly for women and people from marginalized groups.
“There are so many things that are happening in society that make people feel like they don’t belong,” she said. “Sometimes it’s not just in your head.”
That distinction matters because confidence should not require journalists to ignore what is actually standing in their way.
Instead, the panel encouraged journalists to ask a different question: What do I need to learn, and who can help me get there?
During an exercise, attendees wrote down an opportunity they had been putting off and the reasons they had given themselves for not pursuing it. Then they rewrote those thoughts.
“I’m not qualified to pitch a science story,” became: “I’m not qualified to pitch a science story yet.”
The word was small. The shift was not.
Panelists also encouraged journalists to create a “brag file,” a running record of stories they are proud of, positive feedback, skills they have developed and difficult assignments they successfully navigated.
It serves as a tangible reminder that journalists often remember their failures more vividly than their accomplishments.
When panelists were asked how student journalists can navigate imposter syndrome while surrounded by more experienced professionals, they pushed back on the idea that being a student makes someone less of a journalist.
“You are already a journalist,” Spates said. “You’re going to have a lot to learn, but that doesn’t make you any less of a journalist.”
Being a journalist does not mean knowing everything. It means continuing to learn while recognizing that inexperience does not erase the work you have already done.
Most importantly, it means not allowing the voice that says you can’t make the decision before you ever get the chance to find out. The panelists made one thing clear: Imposter syndrome may not disappear with experience. Awards, titles and years in the newsroom do not necessarily silence it.
You just get better at answering back.
Featured photo by McKenna Manzo.