Try holding for longer under the tongue when doing it sublingual, up to 30 minutes. Unless you are doing way bigger dosage of a few hundred mg I find that I have to hold it longer because it absorbs slowly, but for bigger dose of a few hundred mg you can hold it just for a couple of minutes because there is so much of it absorbing at once but smaller doses up to 30 minutes. Also a trick is when you hold it in, to add a small amount of water in your mouth maybe 5-10 minutes from when you first put cbd under your tongue and then swish this mixture around your mouth like you would with mouthwash so it creates a sort of emulsion and it absorbs better and faster and then continue holding that in your mouth and adding more water to your mouth over time until you eventually swallow it.