The mentality of "go big or go home" and the current ethos in the fitness community believing we should always be doing "high-intensity training" to see improvement, are both fallacies.
What ultimately limits the results you get from your workouts is often not the exercises, sets, reps, or weight you lift in the gym. It is the other 23-hours in the day when you are not in the gym. That is because your body does not get stronger, more fit, leaner, or better conditioned while you are training. The changes you want to see only happen through the process of recovery, which takes place in the hours and days after your workout is over.
Similarly to training, recovery programming needs to follow a systematic approach whereby the prescription chosen best helps put our body in a position to accept the next training load.
With that being said, today's recovery day is pertinent to your overall training program, and should be considered another important piece in the puzzle, for improving your overall health and performance.