responding within the text of original post...

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<We know desire cause all kinds of troubles, attachment, wanting, feelings of lack, wanting to force things and make them happen, anger jealousy, etc. So we give them up, perhaps suppress them, perhaps replace them through hopefully partially healing blissful practice.>

Desire can be directed and can be transformed. If we want to conquer and diminish others, we can learn to direct that kind of ignorance into striving to better ourselves. Lust can be directed (to some degree) to a desire for bodily purity (as in striving to run a marathon, become a proficient in Hatha Yoga and just generally direct "the body's" interests in directions we find more positive). Greed can be directed into a kind of positive ambition. Instead of being "ambitious" to lord our will over everyone, we can be "ambitious" to give the most, help the most, care the most, etc. etc. etc.

<Yet, even the desire to practice is attachment. Don't we need desire to become the Buddha?>

The questions is valid, but some take it to be some kind of intellectual game. This question was answered in various ways, by many spiritual teachers. The answer is basically, yes, you need to desire to move. Without movement, there is no progress. Without progress, there is no Enlightenment. People may think they can be fat lazy blobs lying on the sofa and become realized, but it is not the case.

To this end, I believe it was Joshu who said something like blankness is not emptiness.

Christ said, "if the salt loses its seasoning, how shall it then be seasoned?"

Thomas Merton said, "too much austerity makes a stone of the heart"

St. Theresa of Avila discussed that contemplatives need, at time to take "recreation."

Sri Krishna said, I (God) am desire unopposed to dharma.

So, there is desire which is destructive and then there is dynamism. They may seem to be the same thing, but they are not. One is productive and illuminating. One is self-absorbed, narcissistic and living in self-induced delusion. They said of General McArthur, that he was so consumed with his own ego that he actually began to believe that his personal desires were necessarily the truth.

Don't we need desire to become even empty?
Where does the term "longing" fit in? Is t not normal in our evolutionary journey to long for a higher spiritual awakening... and is that longing not also a desire?

<How do you deal with desire?>

The short answer is by practicing the path...in all its aspects. Desire does not drop away easily. It slowly gets transformed into a higher and better direction, by degrees. There are supposed to be some very advanced states where desire ceases, but I am not familiar with them.


<Can you meditate them away or replace them with some bliss?>

Yes, as above, they slowly get replaced with spiritual things. But they do so by degrees. Bliss is a very very high state. They usually get replaced with just a kind of enthusiastic joy, as opposed to some kind of obsessive craving. That is a very very positive step.

<Is it ok potentially to attach to our own Buddha-nature?>

Not sure what you mean. If you mean, can we become obsessive about spirituality? Sri Ramakrishna said something like...to remove a thorn, first we take another thorn, then pry out the first thorn. Then both can be thrown away. He said that in regards to using tamas, let us say, to drive out ignorance. Or, that the thorn was japa....which, when fully manifested, realizes the goal. Then japa, as a thorn, is no longer necessary. Or, in more basic level. First we spiritualize our desires, using that force to carry us with aspiration toward our goal. Then, I guess, when the goal is reached, the desires are no longer necessary? My best guess. I am not at the point of no desires, so I don't know.

<Who of you is beyond desire and how did you do it, let me know?>

Supposedly, only fully perfected beings get to that state. I have heard that at any time, there are perhaps 10 or 12 such people on the planet.