Knowing Emptiness...

Nirvana is the actual antidote or "active ingredient" in the medicine
of the Dharma.

A single, direct, nondualistic realization of emptiness
eradicates permanently some portion of the desire, hatred, and
ignorance that have bound one in misery for infinite cycles of time up
until that moment.

Repeated realizations over many lifetimes are still
needed before all of the ancient roots of ignorance can be eradicated.

During this training, the bodhisattva alternates between periods of
meditation on emptiness and periods of compassionate action in the
world.

Even after the bodhisattva escapes samsara altogether, she must
still practice for a long time to overcome the "hangover" of dualistic
appearances, the aftereffects of having been ignorant for so long.

Finally, these last limitations are cleared away and the bodhisattva
becomes a buddha.

A buddha continuously knows emptiness directly while
also simultaneously acting compassionately in the world of persons and
forms.



--from "Introduction to Emptiness: As Taught in Tsong-kha-pa's Great
Treatise on the Stages of the Path" by Guy Newland, published by Snow
Lion Publications