I wouldn't call that "brave". "Putting ego aside" is hard, requires a lot of work and in most situations it's a safe thing to do. Hence no bravery here, maybe loyalty would be a better word.

He was being brave when he brought his problem to his superiors and said he'd like to quit. Actually, the only "braver" thing in this situation would be to quit anyway, without letting them "talk him out of quitting". But that could have been also stupid, we don't know the exact circumstances.

On a more general note: everyone should try to ~~contain~~ [edit: solve!] his/her ego-issues (and other psychological issues) as much as possible, of course. But placing someone with mentioned issues on the project which caused these issues in the first place is clearly a fail of management. If "soft skills" are so important (and they are), then the management should use them! Management should place employees in an optimal environment so that psychological issues are less likely to occur. Making people work for a long time on things they are averse to is a recipe for disaster. Both for the employee and the project.

In fairness, he did say he tried. Perhaps there was a lack of bravery, perhaps he could have gone to this bosses and explained the situation, but perhaps he did that and it wasn't enough.

It's also likely that he didn't realize what he was doing at the time. Maybe he felt upset or stressed about the situation but not necessarily that he was subconsciously hoping to failure.

We are all on a learning journey of life.