I've been a full time programmer for 12 years, and I'm still learning. There is no magical 6 month course that at the end of you're a 'programmer'. I'd say the majority of programmers are programmers because they enjoy the challenges of problem solving and controlling processes. I'd also say that most programmers are self taught anyway!
I'm also not sure there is now standard way to learn either. Sure you could take a course, but it will probably skip out lots of parts along the way. For example, learning to program websites in Ruby, won't teach you the basics of mathematics or algorithms.
Read as much as you can, from as many sources as you can. Start simple, which IS slow, and takes a lot of time, and won't have much to show for your endeavours, but build on it, and you'll be able to accomplish anything