FAILING IS EVOLVING WITH COURAGE: THE NEUROSCIENCE OF FAILURE AND THE REBIRTH OF THE AUTHENTIC SELF

Pause for a moment what you are doing. Take a deep breath. And honestly reflect on this phrase:
“Success is not the absence of failure, but the ability to learn from them and continuously improve.” — James Clear
How many times have you found yourself paralyzed by a failure?
How many times have you overlooked that every truly evolutionary process inevitably demands internal ruptures and momentary collapses of perception?
We live in times where the fallacy of continuous success still reigns as an unquestionable ideal. However, what is rarely discussed — and that few dare to consciously experience — is that all genuine human development requires destabilization.
Without the discomfort caused by failure, there is no expanded cognition.
Without the shaking of certainties, there is no real neuroplasticity.
And, above all, without facing failure as a constitutive part of the identity in formation, there is neither emotional maturity nor conscious leadership.
Therefore, today, I want to challenge you:
What if failure — that feared specter haunting brilliant minds — were actually the hidden foundation of sustainable success?
James Clear’s phrase is not just motivational; it carries a profound call to redefine our relationship with life’s setbacks. It’s not about avoiding failure, but understanding it as a catalyst for growth, an internal reorganizer, and a revealer of dormant potentialities.
In a world obsessed with flawless performance, this perspective challenges us to abandon linear thinking and embrace the systemic complexity of human development.
And science, more than confirming — inspires us:
Neuroimaging studies reveal that when we fail, a brain region called the anterior cingulate cortex is instantly activated, signaling a break in expectation. This “cognitive alarm” initiates a fundamental internal adjustment process for learning and adaptation. In other words:
Failing literally reorganizes your brain.
Now think about everyday situations:
• A professional who presents a poorly received proposal and, instead of retreating, revisits their arguments, listens more attentively, and adjusts their communication — is refining their cognitive plasticity.
• A leader who makes a flawed strategic decision and humbly admits the mistake to their team — is not only humanizing leadership but strengthening psychological safety, a key performance factor in teams as evidenced by Google’s Aristotle project.
• A young person who fails an important exam and, instead of self-sabotaging, investigates their mental patterns, cultivates emotional self-regulation, and builds new study habits — is practically applying the foundations of Barry Zimmerman’s Self-Regulated Learning Theory.
These examples are not heroic. They are human.
But when welcomed with presence and awareness, they become invisible platforms for deep evolution.
As Vygotsky taught us, failure is a zone of proximal development — a territory between what we already know and what we have yet to achieve. It invites us to leave the safe place of predictable performance and cast ourselves into the unknown of continuous self-transformation.
Neuroscientist Eric Kandel demonstrated that in the face of challenges and behavioral adjustments, synaptic connections strengthen. Each failure, therefore, is an impulse to neural plasticity and the refinement of adaptive consciousness.
Imagine an executive facing resistance during an organizational restructuring. Instead of succumbing to self-criticism, they listen, analyze friction points, refine their approach, and emerge more strategic.
Failure, in this scenario, is not the end — it is the beginning of a new cycle of evolutionary leadership.
And let this be clear:
This is not about romanticizing failure. It’s about understanding it through the lens of complexity, science, and philosophy.
Recognizing it as a portal to new internal repertoires — provided it is crossed with courage, listening, and genuine intention to grow.
This article is an invitation.
Let’s together demystify failure, reclaim its hidden intelligence, and discover how it can become our most potent ally on the path to personal, relational, and organizational excellence.
________________________________________
FAILURE AS AN EPISTEMOLOGICAL RUPTURE
In organizations, failure is still treated with almost punitive stigma. And for that reason, environments that genuinely foster innovation are rare.
How can we expect people to think outside the box if every daring attempt is met with punishment or discredit? Failure must cease to be a marker of incompetence and become evidence of a genuine attempt at expansion.
Nietzsche taught us that it is in the abyss that the self meets itself. And there is no abyss more necessary — and fertile — than the one between who you are now and who you are about to become. In this reinvention interval, failure functions as a catalyst. It is a sign of movement. A symptom of a legitimate search for meaning, identity, and self-actualization.
By finding meaning in suffering, it ceases to be paralyzing and becomes formative. Under this perspective, failure ceases to be bankruptcy and becomes foundation.
I recall a CEO who instituted the practice of “lessons learned” meetings at the end of every project — regardless of success level. This simple change in logic transformed failures into sources of learning, strengthened the innovation culture, and substantially elevated the collective maturity of the team.
________________________________________
THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE AUTHENTIC SELF PASSES THROUGH THE COLLAPSE OF THE IDEALIZED SELF
Most people — even the most educated or experienced — still try to avoid failure not due to lack of intelligence, but out of fear of dismantling their idealized self-image. Psychologically, failing confronts us with the possibility of not being what we would like — or what others expect — us to be. And this deeply shakes the support of the so-called ideal self.
Erving Goffman, in The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, shows that we build social characters who perform roles, seeking acceptance and belonging. We create “performance masks” that do not always reflect who we really are. But when we fail, these masks crack. The varnish of control fades away, and what emerges is the raw, vulnerable — but real — self. And this, far from weakness, can be the beginning of authenticity.
Donald Winnicott, in turn, warned about the risk of maintaining the false self for too long — a self molded to meet external expectations that overshadows the true self. He said:
“It is only by being true that one can live. The false self leads to feelings of unreality or emptiness.”
Failure, in this context, acts as a catalyst for subjective truth. It is in the breaking of the idealized character that we begin to access more genuine layers of being. The collapse, therefore, is not the end — it is rebirth.
Here lies the beauty of the paradox: we can only sustain an “authentic self” when we are willing to see crumble what we never truly were.
By entering the systemic universe, we understand that failure is not only individual, but also collective. Social Psychology, through Solomon Asch and Stanley Milgram, shows us how culture and group shape our perception of failure. Pierre Bourdieu, in turn, demonstrates how habitus — that system of embodied dispositions — silently shapes our decisions. In other words, often the “failure” is merely the visible symptom of a dysfunctional system.
In a recent consulting project, we found that a company’s high turnover was mistakenly attributed to “lack of employee commitment.” Upon observing the system, we identified structural failures: communication gaps, absence of feedback, and misaligned goals. After adjustments inspired by agile approaches, systemic alignment, and continuous feedback, turnover dropped by 40% in six months. The initial diagnostic failure became a springboard for organizational transformation.
From the Social Psychology perspective, this process is even deeper. Leon Festinger’s cognitive dissonance theory demonstrates that discomfort generated by contradictions between behavior and self-image activates internal reevaluation mechanisms. When well-managed, this movement fosters a more robust identity realignment — more coherent with our core values. In other words: failure makes us more integral, not less.
But beware: this path is not automatic. It demands that failure is not denied or projected, but elaborated. That shame is replaced by curiosity. That rigidity gives way to self-compassion and self-responsibility. Only then does the collapse of the idealized self cease to be trauma and become transition. A necessary psychic rite for us to emerge more authentic, more human, more whole.

After all, as Carl Jung said:
“I prefer to be whole than to be good.”

WHY DO WE AVOID MISTAKES EVEN KNOWING THEY ARE AN ESSENTIAL PART OF GROWTH?
“There are those who see the fall as the end of the journey. But there are also those who discover wings hidden on the back of the soul.” – Marcello de Souza
Knowing rationally that error is necessary does not make us emotionally prepared for it. This dissonance between knowing and feeling has deep roots — neurobiological, psychological, and cultural. We avoid mistakes not because they actually threaten us, but because they activate brain circuits linked to social pain, shame, and fear of exclusion.

The neuroscience of threat
When we make mistakes, especially in front of others, the brain interprets this as a threat to social status. The amygdala, a primitive danger-detection center, springs into action. Alongside it, the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex tries to respond rationally but is often sabotaged by the instinctive reaction of flight or freeze.
Studies such as those by Matthew Lieberman at UCLA have shown that the brain processes social exclusion in the same circuits as physical pain. This explains why the fear of making mistakes in public can be visceral. And in corporate environments, this fear intensifies: by failing, we risk not only reputation but also belonging, stability, and future prospects.
As Brené Brown, expert on shame and vulnerability, teaches us, error often triggers internal narratives of insufficiency: “I am a failure” instead of “I made a mistake.” This confusion between fact and identity is one of the main reasons we freeze in the face of failure.
According to Brown:
“Shame is the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging.”
Shame paralyzes. Unlike guilt, which can generate active responsibility, shame creates silence, isolation, and self-punishment. Organizations that do not distinguish error from incompetence feed this cycle, suffocating creativity and innovation.

Cognitive biases and the “blind spot” of self-awareness
Moreover, we fall victim to our own cognitive biases. Confirmation bias makes us seek evidence that we are right, avoiding confronting contradictions. The “fundamental attribution error” bias leads us to judge our mistakes as the result of external factors, but others’ mistakes as character flaws.
This mental architecture protects us from pain but prevents growth. Consciously erring requires the temporary suspension of ego and a brutal courage: the courage to see oneself honestly.

ERROR AS AN ORGANIZATIONAL TABOO
Culturally, error remains taboo. Companies promote “learning culture” discourses but silently punish experimentation that doesn’t succeed. As a result, environments emerge where everyone pretends excellence, but few dare to truly innovate.
It is in this context that the concept of psychological safety, coined by Amy Edmondson of Harvard Business School, stands out. She demonstrates that teams with greater freedom to openly err and learn together achieve better results, higher engagement, and continuous innovation. Google confirmed this in their Aristotle project, identifying psychological safety as the #1 factor for high team performance.
Making mistakes, therefore, is not only an individual process — it is a systemic phenomenon. We are shaped by cultures, belief systems, and structures that sometimes suffocate, sometimes potentiate our development. And when error is treated with honesty, active listening, and social support, it transforms into what it should always have been: a rehearsal for getting it right.

Philosophical insights on error
Plato saw error as a path to self-knowledge. Spinoza invited us to reflect on the power to act hidden behind each deviation. When we understand error not as a moral failure but as alchemy — a process that transmutes ignorance into wisdom — we open space for a new aesthetics of learning.
Imagine a leader who, upon making a strategic mistake, chooses to expose vulnerability authentically before the team. It is possible to find meaning in failure and transform adversity into an atmosphere of trust. This is not fragility — it is evolutionary maturity. As Seneca said:
“The truly wise man rejoices in mistakes, for he knows that each one led him to a better understanding of himself.”
Error is more than a failure — it is a gateway. A crossing between the conditioned self and the authentic self. A systemic approach reveals that we do not err alone. Each failure carries an invisible cartography of relationships, contexts, and collective learnings. Failure is an invitation to reconstruction — not only internal but also intersubjective.
And in this process, true transcendence is born.

But making mistakes alone teaches nothing
What transforms error into master is the way we interpret, metabolize, and emotionally integrate this experience. The difference between a sterile failure and a transformative failure lies in two key skills: metacognition and emotional self-regulation.

1. Metacognition: from failure to refinement of consciousness
John Flavell, who coined the term metacognition, showed that individuals capable of observing and analyzing their own thoughts learn more deeply. They do not merely identify what went wrong but recognize the mental patterns that led to the error: unquestioned premises, unconscious biases, cognitive shortcuts.
This competence — thinking about one’s own thinking — is the basis of Barry Zimmerman’s self-regulated learning model. In this context, error becomes a mechanism of internal realignment: reformulating strategies, refining goals, and amplifying awareness of oneself and the world.

2. Emotional self-regulation: the invisible muscle of evolution
Transforming failures into wisdom requires emotional muscle. And this begins by enduring the pain of error without collapsing into destructive self-criticism. Emotional self-regulation involves naming, welcoming, and transforming intense emotions — and is neurobiologically anchored in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, responsible for inhibiting impulses and reorganizing actions in the face of frustration.
Research by Richard Davidson, from the University of Wisconsin, shows that people who cultivate emotional awareness and authentic compassion have greater resilience in the face of failure. Practices such as mindfulness strengthen the prefrontal cortex–amygdala axis, promoting emotional stability and clarity of decision — even in adverse contexts.

3. Post-failure growth: pain as an architecture of meaning
Making mistakes hurts. But pain does not need to be empty. The Post-Traumatic Growth Theory, developed by Richard Tedeschi and Lawrence Calhoun, reveals that challenging experiences can generate expansion of identity, renewal of purpose, and strengthening of human bonds.
But this evolution is not automatic. It depends on the ability to narrate the error coherently, connecting pain to meaning. When we integrate our falls into the biography of who we are becoming, error ceases to be a scar — and becomes architecture of meaning.

4. Micropractices to transform error into wisdom
In organizations and in life, it’s not enough to have a new mindset — we must create concrete practices that sustain experiential learning. Some scientifically based strategies:
• Reflective journaling: Regularly writing about decisions, emotions, and learnings activates the neocortex and favors metacognition (Pennebaker, 1997).
• Precision feedback: Requesting and offering feedback based on facts — not judgments — transforms error into data, not drama.
• Circles of trust: Safe spaces where vulnerabilities are shared collectively stimulate emotional innovation and belonging.
• Emotional psychoeducation: Teaching leaders and teams about emotions, biases, and neuroscience applied to error increases maturity and adaptive competence in critical moments.

FROM THE EGO OF PERFECTION TO THE SELF OF WHOLENESS
The true leap in consciousness occurs when we stop seeing error as a threat to identity and begin recognizing it as a rite of passage to complex life. As Jung taught:
“Wisdom begins when we recognize the shadow in ourselves.”
And the shadow of error does not need to be exorcised. It needs to be listened to.
For it is by listening that we transcend the ego of perfection and are reborn on the fertile soil of conscious humility.
There, where we fail lucidly, we grow with integrity.
And we begin again, not as those who return to the start,
but as those who already know — through experience —
what the next level of themselves is.

MAKING MISTAKES IS NOT ENDING — IT IS REBIRTH WITH CONSCIOUSNESS
Making mistakes is inevitable. But maturing with every mistake is a choice — a choice that requires courage, presence, and renouncing the illusion of control. At the core of every failure lies a possibility for expansion: to reorganize the perception of oneself and the world with more humility, wisdom, and integrity.
When we stop interpreting error as a denial of value and start seeing it as raw material for self-knowledge and neurobehavioral development, something extraordinary happens: we access our most authentic Self.
The one defined not by visible achievements but by coherence between what we feel, learn, transform — and share.
Neuroscience leaves no doubt: we are adaptive systems in constant reconstruction. Brain plasticity, post-traumatic growth, metacognition, and emotional self-regulation are not just concepts — they are internal technologies that can be cultivated. But for that, we need to replace the fear of error with the practice of reflection; judgment with curiosity; and punishment with expanded responsibility.
In daily practice, in the organizations we build, in the relationships we cultivate, and in the choices we renew every day, there is always a silent question waiting for an answer:
“Are you willing to grow, even if it means shedding the idealized image of yourself and rebuilding from your most vulnerable point?”
If the answer is yes, then error ceases to be an end — and becomes a rite. Failure ceases to be defeat — and turns into a bridge. And pain ceases to be interruption — and reveals itself as an invitation to reintegration of being with its own evolutionary potential.
May this text be more than reading: may it be a mirror and a call. A reminder that growth requires courage — but erring consciously is, perhaps, the deepest expression of that courage.

#marcellodesouza #marcellodesouzaoficial #coachingevoce #humandevelopment #behavioraldevelopment #neuroscience #philosophy #socialpsychology #consciousleadership #selfknowledge