In ‘Boundless’, Natasha Oswal of Dice Media captures a decade of self-discovery and learning

Natasha Malpani Oswal, Head of Dice Media and author of Boundless believes that authenticity is the key to good storytelling.

Tuesday May 07, 2019 , 4 min Read

The lines from the popular Bees Gees song “...it’s only words and words are all I have..” reverberates in my head as Natasha Malpani Oswal recounts how she took to writing to express her feelings when she was heading into a new phase of life. In her case, words took the form of poetry. Based out of Mumbai, Natasha leads Dice Media, the video division of Pocket Aces, a digital entertainment and content creation company, and makes her debut as an author with Boundless.

Boundless, a book of poems, captures Natasha’s journey of being away from her roots from the age of 20, discovering and finding herself in a new place, and then returning to India back to her roots last year. Boundless captures her journey of learning, losing and loving.

On the road to self-discovery

In the last 10 years that Natasha was away from India, she completed her Masters from Oxford and Cambridge, and an MBA from Stanford. She has worked in four startups in Silicon Valley, London and India. She has also worked in impact investing and cancer research. Believe it or not, Natasha has also been an immunologist.

When she left Mumbai, Natasha realised how sheltered her life had been and in the past 10 years, she has fallen down, picked herself up to run again, and in many ways, discovered herself. A decade away from home gave her a whole new experience but when it was time to head back home, Natasha realised she was heading down a new road to self-discovery. Getting back to India after being away for so long and gave her mixed feelings.

A year before she was due to return, Natasha started writing little notes for herself. “These were little notes on my phone - I put down whatever I was feeling and wanted to capture those thoughts, feelings, and emotions. I knew that I was moving into a new chapter of life and once I moved back, I may not have the same feelings and emotions. It was important to capture what I felt,” shares Natasha.

She began posting these on Instagram and received an overwhelming response when people, especially women, started writing to her saying they could relate to everything she was sharing. The next step was putting all of it together into a book. That’s how Boundless took shape.

You have to be happy first

Natasha says she is happy with the way not just women but others, including parents and older women, have responded to her poems. One of the key messages that she wants to share through her book is the importance of being happy by choosing your own path.

I think each of us has the power to design and shape our own life and we have to find ourselves. It’s taken me going abroad to realise that I needed to find my own identity and please myself. I feel very lucky that I’ve been able to experiment so much because you can’t please others until you please yourself.

Storytelling

Her return to India has been exciting, claims Natasha. Leading Dice Media, she is enjoying the challenge of audio-visual storytelling. Natasha says, “I think, in terms of timing, this is the time to be able to tell stories that travel globally. What I saw in London and the US and now India, I'm so impressed with the way Indian audience is adapting and evolving. And the audience is just getting so smart that you can’t offer them mediocre content anymore.”

And it is not limited to metros, but Tier II and III audience too wants great and relatable content. "So the audience is getting smarter and more demanding,” she adds.

As Natasha points out, authenticity is the key to storytelling and good content.

It is something that her book of poems echoes. Her feelings and emotions are travelling globally because what people experience and feel don't change across geographies, and that is what one of Natasha’s poems aptly sums up:

Small World

We pride

ourselves on our open minds

our ability to connect

across borders and

colors of skin

we recognize; we respect

But we’re the same person

under the layers

of lived experiences

In our own highly curated

filtered bubbles