Courtney Act reveals the one thing that helped her cope with Ann Widdecombe in Celebrity Big Brother
Courtney Act won Celebrity Big Brother Season 21 (Wiktor Szymanowicz / Barcroft Media via Getty Images)
RuPaul’s Drag Race star Courtney Act has said meditation helped her cope with living in the Celebrity Big Brother house last year.
Act, who identifies as pansexual, says meditation helped her live alongside fellow contestant Ann Widdecombe, who repeatedly voted against LGBT+ rights as a Conservative minister and shadow home secretary.
Widdecombe opposed repealing Section 28, an amendment to the Local Government Act 1988, which banned local authorities and schools from “promoting” homosexuality.
Act says learning to meditate helped her become more patient while living in close quarters with other contestants on the 21st season of Celebrity Big Brother, which she won.
She told HuffPost: “It’s so easy to be polarised and yell from different sides of the room about certain subjects, but I think it’s so much better to walk into the middle and have a conversation to drive change forward.
Act added: “It’s very easy to not be patient, especially when it’s not just people’s ideas, but you’re living with someone like Ann and her voting record over the course of 23 years.
Courtney Act leaving the CBB house (Photo by Stuart C. Wilson/Stuart C. Wilson/Getty Images)
“It can be very easy to feel anger towards that injustice, but I think meditating helped me keep my patience.
“I tried to make my reaction the best it could be, rather than just reacting and flying off the handle.”
Act, who appeared on season six of RuPaul’s Drag Race, also said she spent 10 days at a silent Vipassana meditation retreat with no phone, TV or books.
Act entered the retreat after a break-up and a skiing accident in 2008.
“I was in a wheelchair with a broken leg, I had no ability to work and make money, I was staying at a friend’s place and everything was miserable. Then I decided to just go and try it,” she explained.
Last year, Act spoke to PinkNews about being pansexual and what it means to her.
She said: “I identify as pansexual – I identify as many things, and many of them contradict.
“I don’t identify as straight – not since I was 15, but that’s just because I was unaware.
“It means that you are attracted to people regardless of their gender – or are attracted to many genders, depending on how you look at it.
“I just like to think that I’m attracted to who I’m attracted to, and I’m not attracted to who I’m not attracted to.
“If someone happens to have a vagina or a penis, I’m not going to let that count out me falling in love with somebody just because of their body parts.”
