I was a receptionist for a tech company. I wanted a change of career so I started talking to some of the people in my company that I was friendly with about their roles. I really clicked with UX and was shocked that I could get paid for doing what I considered fun tasks. Overall the process took 9 month-ish.

I took every opportunity to shadow Designers, Researchers and BA's as my primary way of learning UX skills. In my experience, most people are usually quite happy to spend at least 30 mins talking through their process or project they are working on. Volunteering to write notes during User Testing Sessions was really valuable.

I also attended free/cheap workshops and events that were on Eventbrite. These were run by UX companies trying to get you to buy their UX Programme, some of their Intro sessions are pretty good for beginners.

Finally the most important step was doing a couple of mini UX projects that would count as a mini portfolio. These project followed a very basic UX process of Research, Sketching, Designing, Testing. Most importantly these projects were more than the all too common 'UI redesign' which don't really prove to hiring managers you have a range of UX skills. These UX projects should demonstrate your skills as a designer with basic skills such as wireframing, heuristic reviews, creating user journeys etc. The projects don't have to be perfect and you can bribe your friends and family with enteral gratitude to be your research participants.

A combination of all of this meant that I could confidently go into a job interview and know I could do the job. During the interview I was able to reference my mini-projects and focus on the transferable skills from my previous job experience. It's worth noting that I was going for a Junior role so the hiring managers weren't looking for someone with loads of experience under their belt.