I love Ishmael and My Ishmael! Those books struck me in an environmental and political way; My Ishmael more politically.
To answer your question, I try really hard to not make an impact, but I know I do anyway. I try to waste as little as possible, I recycle, try to use only environmentally friendly products, buy local foods in the summer, donate to animal (including human!) causes, etc. I still feel guilty.
I’m not sure it is possible for people who live in “taker” societies to completely give back. For one thing, we’re not truly “allowed” to completely live off the land. All land (at least here, in the US) is owned by the government. There is no foot of space where you would be allowed to just be. You would have to purchase the land and pay taxes of all kinds in order to so much as sleep on the naked ground, let alone build a home there. You would have to make some sort of income to pay these taxes, and the government won’t accept tomatoes from your garden. So you’d have to get a job. And there begins the cycle of impossibility. You can’t dedicate all your time to joining the workforce and have any time left over to tend to living off the land.
Of course there are very clean alternatives to homes, cars, ways of life these days, but according to what standards? I really don’t know the answer to that. I’m willing to bet it’s not comparable to how the bees and beavers live. Nobody can blame us; it’s our culture now. It would take a huge event to be able to remain in our country and choose to live as a “leaver” instead.