The desire for the Divine or for bhakti for the Divine is the one desire which can free one from all the others — at the core it is not a desire, but an aspiration.
The past in Yoga is no guide to the future. For what happened in the past was due to temporary and not permanent causes and to eliminate them is the very purpose of the sadhana.
In this Yoga the feeling of unity with others, love, universal joy and Ananda are an essential part of the liberation and perfection which are the aim of the sadhana.
You certainly need not be afraid of going into unconsciousness, for it is not unconsciousness that you would go into, but simply the inner consciousness.
Shakespeare was to the French classicists a drunken barbarian of genius; but his spontaneous exuberance has lifted him higher than their willed severity of classical perfection.
If the mind and the vital can feel and accept the soul’s sheer love for the Divine for His own sake, then the sadhana gets its full power and many difficulties disappear.