Board Thread:Character Discussion/@comment-5118208-20141108143108/@comment-26211408-20150318203101

I agree with TheSamTrickster and Lady Junky, with a bit of extra.

I think everyone in the EF has the potential of using magic, and that they all have magic in them, in a sense. It's like everyone has the potential to learn how to whistle, but they don't know it or no one teaches them how to. I mean think about it, the only true magical people we've seen are deities like the dark one, Maleficent, and probably Ursula, while the only humans that have magic had it taught to them sometime/ somewhere in their family trees. Has there ever been someone who wasn't a deity and just had magic, besides True Love? The only people who do were taught or trained to do so.

It's like magic is energy, and everyone has the potential to access it, but not everyone knows how. Teachers, like Gold, show you how to access magic, which is through intense emotions. Once you gain access to the magic, all your children will also have access to magic, and they can attain higher access to magic, making them stronger, which would explain why Zelena is stronger than Cora. It could be like Cora built a bridge (access) to magic, and her children have access to that bridge, but can also build onto that bridge, making it wider (having a stronger connection), meaning the longer the bloodline has had access to magic, the stronger they become.

The reason there are so few magical people is because the people who are naturally magical want to monopolize the power. Who wants to teach someone magic with the knowledge that one day, they can become stronger than you and one day overthrow you? Gold probably saw Cora, Zelena, and Regina as bitter, angry, and vulnerable people, making them easy to manipulate, or saw their future in helping him enact the curse. In any case, then only time people were taught magic was when the teacher wanted to benefit themselves.