While reporting his new book, “Selfie: How We Became So Self-Obsessed and What It’s Doing to Us,” journalist Will Storr attended a week-long workshop at the Esalen Institute, the epicenter of the human-potential movement of the 1960s and ’70s. A shy, curmudgeonly Briton, Storr endures some excruciating group-encounter exercises while trying to maintain a reporter’s remove. He doesn’t belong there, and he’s sure his fellow participants agree. Then a woman from the group challenges him. “ ‘We’ve all been talking about it,’ ” she says. “ ‘Why the hell do you think people don’t like you? . . . You’re sweet. You’re funny. You can’t hide it. Everybody here likes you.’ ”

Storr tries to brush this off, but a swell rises in his throat. In less than a week, he has gone from eye-rolling cynic to member of a tribe. This is one of the many ways “Selfie” illustrates how slippery our identities can be and how quickly we’ll accommodate them to the world around us.

“Selfie” might appear to fit in the genre of high-end pop-psychology books that promise to shed light on the human condition while also telling us how to be more productive, persuasive or in some other way climb a rung or two higher on the winner’s ladder. But this book is no life hack. Rather, in this fascinating psychological and social history, Storr — who has published three other books and is a seasoned foreign correspondent — reveals how biology and culture conspire to keep us striving for perfection, and the devastating toll that can take.

You can read the full review at the Post.