“Emptiness” is a central concept in Mahayana Buddhism, often associated with the perfection of wisdom. However, Emptiness is really just another way of talking about Dependent Origination. Whereas Dependent Origination focuses on the coming together of many causes and conditions to bring about a temporary thing or being, Emptiness, focuses on the absence of a self-contained or permanent person, place, or thing. In other words, nothing exists forever and nothing can exist on its own.