Let’s say you a have a big gut.
But you want a six pack. So, you go online and look for an exercise that will help you.
There, you find that you will need to lower your overall body fat for the abs to show. You are intimidated by the prospect of going on a diet.
You tell this to one of you friends. He tries to cheer you on. He promises to join the gym with you.
You are sick and tired of having a big gut so you decide to start your journey towards having abs.
You join a gym and work your abs until they are sore. Your friend on the other hand doesn’t over work his abs like you do.
The next day you are surprised to see that your abs are still sore and you can’t work them anymore. Your gym coach tells you to give them a week of rest. That week, your friend went to the gym without you. After some rest, your abs start working again. The next day, you join your friend in the gym.
You ask your friend if he had similar troubles. He tells you that he didn’t. Rather he kept working his muscles throughout the week when you were absent. He also tells you that he can now do more reps than he could a week before.
You are tempted to over work your muscles again. But you’ve learnt your lesson.
You start giving some love to all your muscle groups- biceps, neck and shoulder, pecks, legs etc. You don’t over work a muscle anymore. You are more concerned with putting in more reps. You now realize that, you won’t see results after one day of hardcore training. Rather you will see results after you’ve put in regular work, day after day after day.
Here’s what James Clear has to say about it,
Everyone wants to make progress. And there is only one way to do it: put in your reps.
He does a great job at explaining this idea. He cites multiple studies that prove this effect. I highly recommend you read his post. You can find it here- https://jamesclear.com/repetitions