Read!...

If the passage you wish to pray over is so familiar to you that it repeats itself in your memory automatically or too fast, don't be afraid to resort to methods which will slow you down and help you to get beneath the surface connections. Write the text out. Make several copies! A friend of mine, a monk who is also an exegete of international repute, once told me in confidence that when he does lectio divina, he recopies the text again and again to see what differences may exist between what is in his memory and what is actually written. Don't read only with your eyes, but by careful attention try to print the text on your heart.

Also read the parallel passages indicated by the marginal notes. These are a great help, especially if you are using the Jerusalem Bible. Broaden the passage, stretch it by placing other passages which deal with the same message alongside the reading of the day. Remember, the Word interprets itself. 'Scripture is the interpreter of Scripture'. This is the great rabbinic and patristic criterion for lectio divina.

Let your reading become listening (audire), and let your listening become obeying (oboedire). Slow down! It is necessary to relax (vacare) with the readings, because they are made to be listened to. Then the Word will make itself heard! In the beginning was the Word, not the Book, as in Islam! God speaks in lectio. Our reading is our means of listening to God. 'Hear, O Israel!' - this is God's constant call. It resounds in the text and echoes from the text out towards you.

From: ENZO BIANCHI, Praying the Word, An Introduction to «Lectio Divina»,
Cistercian Publication, Kalamazoo 1998,  pp. 93-94.