41-year-old lawyer relocated to Paris, has no plans of moving back to the U.S.: 'It's where I'm supposed to be in the world'

After law school, Adriel Sanders, 41, found work as a corporate securities, mergers and acquisitions attorney. But she didn’t enjoy practicing law. “The whole firm knew it. It was not a well-kept secret. I tried to pretend like I wanted to be a partner, but I couldn’t maintain that image. I didn’t even want to be a lawyer,” Sanders, tells CNBC Make It.

“I didn’t enjoy the work and the expectation to work all the time and I will probably be one of the only attorneys who says it, but I don’t think it’s that intellectually stimulating.”

Sanders, who goes by Adriel Felise online, quit that job and eventually went to work as general counsel for a publicly traded company. At the time, Sanders was living in Washington, D.C. and making $286,656 a year, according to documents reviewed by CNBC Make It. She lived in a studio apartment and paid about $3,000 a month in rent.

“What stereotypically happens to most Black women when they work in corporate America is the type of things I experienced my whole career. You’re constantly hitting up against this glass ceiling,” Sanders says. “I was deeply and truly miserable at the very depths of my little heart and little soul. I knew that it was not sustainable.”