How important are rest days to making it?

What about two?

Depends on your routine.

I lift full body every work day, but my sessions are short. No more than 2 sets per heavy compound lift. Running and calisthenics on the weekend.

If you're going to BTFO your body with a 2 hour full body session with 4+ sets of heavy compounds, then you'll need 48+ hours to recover.

If you're doing a bro-split, then you can train every day, but effectively each body part gets multiple rest days.

Periodically taking a few days off and doing nothing is probably a good idea for everyone. If you're not a NEET, you'll probably have plenty of unplanned rest days forced upon you anyway, so it's not something that really needs to be scheduled.

you don't have to have a pre-determined rest schedule, if you feel rested, and if the muscles you'll be working that day don't feel sore, go to the gym, if not,take a day off or two
it's just as stupid as having a pre-determined lifting schedule i.e.monday A, tuesday B wednesday C and so on, in the long run it doesn't matter what you did on a weekly basis, but rather the culmination of the months and years you spent investing in your body, sometimes you might get through your entire routine 2x in a week, sometimes just 1x, sometimes it might take 2 weeks to do it once
>TL;DR don't get hung up on scheduling your gym time, lift when you feel like, rest when you don't

They also get injured a lot and aren't trying to just grow muscles that look good.

If you are hitting them heavy enough like a body builder or power lifter you got to rest and repair.

post body

not true at all

1 5 minute vo2max interval is more work than an entire hour of lifting weights

its normal to do a set of 4x5 three times a week with two days of easier training and one day of very long steady training

weight lifters are such fucking pussies when it comes to 'rest'

arnold bench pressed for 2 hours a day every day for 5 years
thats how you get swol

Essential if you want to avoid burn out.

Depends on what your definition of a rest day is. If it's sitting on your ass all day long, then you're doing it wrong. Do some recovery exercises on your rest days and incorporate some light cardio.

>arnold bench pressed for 2 hours a day every day for 5 years

I'm assuming OP is natty, though

Rest days are not important.
Rest time is, however.

SLEEP FOOD GYM

You need to try and discovery for yourself.

For me resting is as much important as working be it physical work or mental work. In the past I had this dumb (in my opnion) mindset that feeling the need to rest was just my lazy behavior kicking back so all I needed to do was "man up" and insist until I got used to this very intensive regiment. After wasting a lot of time trying to "man up" I discovered the importance of resting and the impact it has in my production. Also today I don't feel guilty for wasting time or not making something "productive" all the fucking time. I push my limits only for a limited period of time then I rest as much as needed. Sometimes I think a day will do but I wake up the next day feeling that I need another one. In the past I would force myself to work, today I respect my desire and waste another day.

>inb4 this way you never work
Not the case. Resting and rest days get boring after a while. In extreme cases what happen is that I "waste" 3 days in a row. Will it have any impact in the long run? sorry if you answer yes but anyway, thats just my own opnion. Find what works for you and don't feel guilty for wasting time, you can get into a loop where you are always running to reach the next point and never actually enjoy life. I wasted 2 years of my life following this pointless pursuit. At least it teached me a valuable lesson.

Rest recharges the batteries .Gives you a boost. What you lose in time you make up for in efficiency.